When the Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet scandals hit the online poker playing community everyone went crazy with accusations and blame over a conspiracy to part the poker players from their money. It seemed every site was corrupt as one scandal hit after another. Some players felt this was proof that the whole online poker word was rigged to keep players in the game generating rake for the site by any means necessary. If you are a fan of reading the chat box when playing you will notice that sometimes a player suffers a bad beat then goes into the chat box saying the site is rigged, that someone could see their cards, everything apart from the fact that lady luck did not smile upon them on this occasion. But is there a case to answer?
Many people in the poker community are afraid to publicly outline how cheating could be taking place in online poker, because it would scare away the “fish” that supply profit opportunities to the better players. If there becomes a real question in players minds about whether or not to trust the online poker sites, it is very unlikely people would deposit even small amounts of money for fear of being cheated. Anti-gambling groups would lobby against participation and whilst the stronger players would stay loyal to online poker the weaker players would leave seeking other more secure hobbies and pastimes. As this would affect both the poker players and poker rooms profits many just keep quiet about possible cheating and hope for the best that it is not happening.
Poker rooms have a lot to lose by cheating players causing a mass exodus of players from their room. Unfortunately online poker is not regulated so the only way we believe there is no cheating is because a/ there is no exposing of a fraud and b/ the online poker room is known to be legitimate through their reputation.
So why would players believe a bad beat would be cheating? A bad beat ‘rewards’ the pot to a player who otherwise would be losing the pot without this stroke of luck. This keeps them in the game and for every hand played the poker room makes money through the rake. As the algorithms governing the deal are known to be random over millions of hands but are not regulated by anyone to check there is no manipulation, the opportunity is theoretically there to manipulate the swirling of the money to be more evenly distributed than perhaps it would be if normal poker play prevailed, allowing the game to last longer and thus make the poker room more money.
Bizarrely, the cheating can also aid the argument that online poker has never been safer. Once there was suspicion on the super-user accounts that were exposed as cheating at Ultimate Bet and Absolute Poker, the data mining sites, hand histories and analysis of the plays involved showed an unrealistic win rate which could not be circumstantial. The exposing of a somewhat complex series of cheating was exposed quickly and with a high level of accuracy. Every online poker room would have noted that the uncovering of the cheating was very clever. The self policing in online poker through the forums and chat boxes make it difficult for cheating to go unnoticed. Even bots are identifiable through their patterns of play. It should be said that poker rooms have not had lots of examples of fraud or cheating and on the whole online poker appears safe to play.
Do not forget that you can suffer bad beats that are totally legitimate in online poker. As you play lots more hands online than live it stands to reason that you will suffer more bad beats. A 5% chance to hit will seem like it happens far too often online, but then you will have far more situations where a bad beat has the opportunity to hit than if you played live. We must always remain vigilant for cheating when money is involved, but we must also ensure we continue to accept bad beats are part of the game that will never go away. Just make sure that if bad beats are not part of the current hand, you are skilled enough to be playing the hand correctly.
By Malcolm Clarke
Related posts:
