Online Poker Bots Probe
It's been an active week in the world of online poker, or maybe a boring one, depending on your take. No news is bad news for the folks at Full Tilt Poker, who have come under fire for what many believe is turning a blind eye to some form of collusion.
It seems that legal landscapes of online poker, panicking payment processors and payees, and online poker sites pulling out of the US market have taken a back seat to this week's topic du jour.
Most of the controversy centers on suspected "poker bots" based on one player's detailed observation.
Full Tilt hasn't exactly helped matters with their response, shunning any concept of the reported "poker bots".
A player started a firestorm on the very popular Two Plus Two Posting forums.
I discovered NL bots on Full Tilt earlier this year and reported them. Full Tilt investigated them for many weeks and asked me to refrain from posting about them until the investigation was complete. At the end of March, the bots disappeared, almost assuredly having had their accounts frozen. A week ago, Full Tilt emailed me that their investigation had been concluded, thanked me for my help, but refused to provide any details about the bots or the investigation. Before I had a chance to make this post, the situation took an absurd new twist. The bot accounts have now begun playing again, presumably having been cleared by Full Tilt???
These aren't just NL bots, but WINNING DEEPSTACK NL bots. The threat that everyone assumed was a few years away is already here.
More Reads from Gambling911.com:
The poker player in question illustrates in full detail his analysis, which on the surface, appears pretty thorough and makes for a good read - just too long for this page.
Full Tilt Poker eventually responded after much debate by fellow online poker players:
We take bots very seriously, and for obvious reasons cannot go into the details of our policies, procedures and detection methods. Our meetings served to further refine these policies and processes in general terms, and also with regards to this investigation specifically. Having said that, if Full Tilt Poker Security confirms the use of a bot by any player, all accounts involved would be permanently closed and all funds remaining in the accounts could be subject to seizure.
After doing our due diligence in this case, we came to the following determinations:
• During the investigation we found the evidence to be inconclusive in supporting either determination (human or bot).
• After careful consideration, the evidence did not warrant the seizure of funds and permanent account closure.
• We stand by our decision. Having said that, re-opening an account after an investigation such as this one does not mean we have made an irreversible decision. We will continue to reevaluate this situation.
It is our responsibility to ensure a level playing field for all of our players. As evidenced by this thread, some situations are not as clear cut as they first appear and require additional refinement of established policies and procedures. We are working on additional measures to detect any activity that compromises the integrity and fairness of our games; this is of paramount importance and will never be taken lightly.
Full Tilt's response has not exactly boded well with other online poker players. One individuals following the developments explained just why the majority of people seemed to believe there is a strong case for "something awry here" whether or be bots playing poker or some form of collusion between a group of players.
Darse Billings, lead designer of the Vex Bot told MSNBC he believes the odds are better than 50-50 that other programmers have secretly unleashed bots on commercial poker sites,
Of course the results were inconclusive. Short of having a video of them cheating or using spyware to find a bot program on their computer (and from what I understand even this can be easily circumvented), there's no way you can have 100% conclusive proof that they were botting.
However, by examining the stats and the responses by the suspects themselves in this thread, it should be fairly obvious that these guys are a huge favorite to be playing in an unethical manner.
-The deviations between the stats show less variation than what a single player would show between various samples.
-At least one of the guys has lied more than once in the thread. (referring to the accused participation in the "bot" thread)
-They always play at the same time. Nobody ever takes a pee break, nobody plays from their home computer, etc. etc.
-They claim to constantly discuss hands, yet their game never changed nor improved during the course of the data set.
This isn't an American court. A reasonable doubt alone isn't enough to justify allowing these guys to continue to play on Full Tilt. As long as these guys are better than 50% to be cheating, Full Tilt has every reason to show them the door. Personally I make it at better than 90% they're cheating.
But can anything be done to prevent these so-called "poker bots"?
One player thinks he knows the solution:
The solution is intrusive scanning of regular players (say above a certain play threshold - maybe 500 hands/week), and the locking out of anyone who doesn't give full access to the poker site's program. That would wipe out 99% of bots, as you'd have to program a custom virtual machine to run your programs - not an easy thing to do.
I know that a few months ago, Full Tilt didn't even do the most basic scanning for bots, unlike the industry leaders (Party and Stars), and I doubt anything has changed. Given that, I'm not encouraged by Full Tilt's empty assurances.
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Christopher Costigan, Gambling911.com
Originally published May 11, 2007 10:02 am ET
