The Absolute Poker Controversy

There currently exists a very disturbing situation with regards to the Absolute Poker website. This may affect people on this site because currently Ultimate Bet and Absolute Poker are owned by the same company. You can find lots of threads about this on both the pocketfives website and at twoplustwo forums. In a nutshell, there are serious allegations about breaches in security at Absolute Poker that permitted certain users to know their opponents' cards. (I realize that this sounds like the same old "online poker is rigged" story that has been circulating around the Internet forever, but there are extremely damning hand histories out there which are virtually impossible to interpret in any other way). Management at Absolute Poker is simply denying the possibility that this happened, but most knowledgeable poker players don't believe them. Pocketfives has removed the ads for Absolute Poker from its site. I have no vested interest in this situation at all, but am simply alerting you people that this is out there, and suggest that you look at the evidence yourself.

 

Is this true Russ Hamilton owns ultimatebet and absolute? WOW. I always thought he was just an affiliate or something as such.
http://www.neverwinpoker.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=44393&view=findpost&p=695225

 

http://plusev.net/comics/plusev20071015.gif

 

Russ Hamilton NOT involved

From Dan Druff, who's been the leader on this...

 

Superuser and the Bot

Maybe some of you are aware UB poker and at first UB EBJ was rumored to have Bots programed into games. If you search the Bot lists found by drudging thru google UB BOTS its isnt apparent any of the Superusers were Bots. I read an interesting forum entry that said Bots are almost impossible to program into poker but blackjack was possible because of the laws of basic strategy. At times playing on the UBTClub EBJ is miserable and I mean MISERABLE because the all ins and split banks get wins left and right. This makes you want to puke and shake your head in disbelief any live person could do that LOL. Obviously any Superusers are pure cheats but how do y'all feel about Bots? Is any online company that uses a Bot a cheater? Are Bots realy in online games?

 

Bots

There are many Poker Bots freely available on the market; The highest used one is Poker Android which ties in With a Poker training Program called Holdem Inspector,
Holdem Inspector can load in various profiles to literally tell you how to play any hand on almost all big Poker Sites inc AP, UB, Pokerstars and so on, some how it reads the cards that you have and the common ones works out thousands of hands then based on profile number of players etc tells you what move to make,

If you add Poker Android to this program you can just log into a room and leave your Bot playing all night, A 30 day trial version of both bits of software are available but trial versions will only work on non cash game

I also heard a guy in Germany is developing a BJ Online Tournament trainer which I’m in 2 minds as to whether this is a good thing

http://www.pokerinspector.com/
http://www.pokerandroid.com/droid/home.aspx

 

Very interesting Mace. I knew the odds calculators were available but had no idea you could run your own Bot!

 

The scarier bit is that i did read about a program although I can't remember the name of it that goes one step further, it allows you to network Multiple ID Bots into a sit n go poker and shares the info from the multiple entries you have in that game and acts on this, That is why bar Clububt where you can play at no financial risk or playing Heads Up, I rarely play online poker as it is open to so much trickery and collusion.

Even a moron without all these programs can simply have a messenger window open and be in collusion with a friend so chances of ever getting a 100% straight online poker game near on zero.

At least with online blackjack tournaments although collusion is possible, IE one player takes high one take low or sharing of secret bet info to make chances high etc the overall damage that can be done by cheating and collusion is much lower. Lets be honest we don't need a beta testing id to know the dealers hole card on UB/BET21 any way 10 up he has a 20
2 or 3 Up does not matter what he has in the hole he will always make 21
:laugh:

 

This is all bad news Mace from Absolute Poker to the infestation of the Bot. The integrity of the cyber game is under assault, it has been compromised. The only way to get a fair game is in live play, which is unfortunate for you European players and your void of live games....

 

And that's only a maybe.

 

youtube has the video's of the poker games in question at AP
watch and be amazed

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fczb...inosmack.com/blog/the-absolute-poker-scandal/

 

They finally come clean

Here's an e-mail I received today from Absolute Poker :

"Dear Valued Customer,

We are writing to update you on events surrounding the recent security breach on our site.

First, it is important to know that the security breach, which resulted in unfair play, was resolved immediately after it was confirmed. The known period of unfair playing was approximately 40 days in length, beginning on August 14, 2007. We want to assure you that since that time, AP's sites have been and continue to be absolutely secure.

At this point, all players known to have been adversely impacted by the security breach have been fully reimbursed with interest. The amount that was illicitly 'won' by the illegitimate accounts was approximately US $800,000. The amount reimbursed to players by us as a result of the security breach to date was approximately US $1,600,000.

So far, the accounts known to have been involved are: potripper, graycat, steamroller, doubledrag, payup, supercard55, and romnaldo. These accounts have been closed. All players who played against these accounts during the period in question have received refunds, plus interest, for the net amounts lost.

This incident was a major shock to us and as a result we are continuing our internal investigation and working on many initiatives to improve the transparency and security of our business. In addition, the Kahnawake Gaming Commission has engaged a third party auditor to review all potentially affected transactions and to verify that the security breach has been closed. If further investigation reveals that any other accounts were fraudulent, we will refund any other affected players in the same manner.

Obviously, we cannot refund players for games where there is no evidence of an unfair advantage. However, if you have:

1) played and lost against these accounts during the period in question and you have not received a refund please provide us with the specifics (i.e. Dates and descriptions of tourney or games played against these accounts) so we can further investigate your claims.

2) If you believe another account had an unfair advantage, please provide us with the account name so we can investigate that account and specific games or tournaments that you would like us to investigate.

Also, with any such request, please provide your full legal name, address, and the name(s) of your account(s). We will process your inquiries and respond as soon as we complete our verification. Please note that although it will take time to process these requests, we are conducting our internal audit as quickly as we can.

We deeply regret the damage that has been done to our players and to our credibility within the poker community by this unfortunate incident. We are committed to doing the right thing for our loyal customers, affiliates, employees, shareholders and business partners, and we will continue to work with our gaming commission and its independent auditor to bring this incident into the full light of day and to right any wrongs.

Please understand that we are experiencing a high volume of inquiries and we are working hard to compile specific data and process them as quickly as possible.

Thank you for your patience and continued support.

Absolute Poker Management"