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Poker Bots Invade Online Gambling

.allirrog drow eht htiw dnopser esaelp ,siht daer nac uoy fI

^Are you telling me that it is not too difficult to interpret that sort of message?
Gorrilla can be replaced with something along the lines of the result of 2+2, or as suggested, the state of the game (i.e the last card dealt) - all while in reverse.
 
So an interesting problem is how do you write code to spot bots ?

It has to be a protocol rather than a 0/1 test. I would first look for deterministic behavior of the players. Unless randomness is explicitly enforced and sub-optimal plays allowed, a program *always* plays the same move given the same amount of time and the same configuration. Keyword is *always*. Then, I would (as a server) buy/prescribe to all known publicly available bots, and test the plays on those. If they match plays of the players far to often, detection procedure continues.

After that, a contact should follow to the player directly.

Still, if you are smart enough, you can work your way around that. I could do it.
 
.allirrog drow eht htiw dnopser esaelp ,siht daer nac uoy fI

^Are you telling me that it is not too difficult to interpret that sort of message?
Gorrilla can be replaced with something along the lines of the result of 2+2, or as suggested, the state of the game (i.e the last card dealt) - all while in reverse.

No player wants to be bothered by stupid messages from the server. Plus, many if not all big servers are international and people do not necessarily have to be able to reply / understand the language. A generic 'me no understand' could be sent back to the server.
 
No player wants to be bothered by stupid messages from the server. Plus, many if not all big servers are international and people do not necessarily have to be able to reply / understand the language. A generic 'me no understand' could be sent back to the server.

Or even easier, every hour or so (random time is best) a captcha could be used.
 
No player wants to be bothered by stupid messages from the server. Plus, many if not all big servers are international and people do not necessarily have to be able to reply / understand the language. A generic 'me no understand' could be sent back to the server.

no player wants to be bothered... except when they complain about bots.

Basically, you can explicitely in the site as part of the EULA that if you don't respond to the message, your funds will be frozen and confiscated. People will respond right away regardless of the language.
 
no player wants to be bothered... except when they complain about bots.

Basically, you can explicitely in the site as part of the EULA that if you don't respond to the message, your funds will be frozen and confiscated. People will respond right away regardless of the language.
That's what I was thinking too - but then your poker site will have less demand. It may not be worth it.
 
One way to detect the presence of a bot is by sending a message to the player. All these poker sites have a way for the players to communicate with each other by means of IM of some sort. Posing as an administrator of the site and asking a question regarding the state of the game might lead to detect a bot. This is just an idea but it's trivial and relatively easy to implement.

I know the bot writer will come up with ways to go around it but this could be a good starting point.

@euroazn
Take a look at this post. Posting as an administrator of the site and asking a question regarding anything about the game could lead us to catch some keywords and the code could respond adequately. Have you seen Japanese "lecturers" (robots) how they respond to students' questions? It is not too difficult to provide the basic keyword terminology and make a bot dance around it adequately. For example if the question was regarding the state of a game posted in slangs or good grammar as Alan said, then we could program all possible combinations of such questions and write a code in such way that it gives the response in human readable manner to remove doubts. And also, the same question could be answered in many ways to avoid duplicate responses.
 
This cat and mouse game of the site and bot programmer modifying their codes will go for a while until the rules change radically. The Captcha solution seems like a good strategy as well.
 
Or even easier, every hour or so (random time is best) a captcha could be used.

The site owner won't try to detect a bot unless somebody complained because they are making money from the bot as well. At that point, they can deploy the message/captcha trick.
 
The site owner won't try to detect a bot unless somebody complained because they are making money from the bot as well.

If bots are revealed then the money making activity will be over since players loose faith and nobody will be willing to play again. In contrast if the site attempts to catch bots and spread the policy issue to be willing to reveal such fraud practices then maintenance of players will be easier. That's a trade-off it faces: temporary money making and being silent or chasing bots and maintaining legitimate players.
 
It does not specify in the article what happens if you are detected to run a bot. Do they confiscate all your balance with no chance to clear it up?
I don't play poker online but I would imagine you open an account, connect it with a bank/credit card and for some reason, the host mistakenly identify you as a bot and all your deposit/winning/balance is gone?
 
It does not specify in the article what happens if you are detected to run a bot. Do they confiscate all your balance with no chance to clear it up?
I don't play poker online but I would imagine you open an account, connect it with a bank/credit card and for some reason, the host mistakenly identify you as a bot and all your deposit/winning/balance is gone?

Depends on the principals by which you are suspected to be running a bot. If those conditions are satisfied, for example gives the same responses on the same messages or gives ambiguous answers with no possibility of clarifying then you could be identified to be running a bot and then your account might be confiscated. But confiscation doesn't mean you loose it. Maybe it will be halted for further investigation.
 
If bots are revealed then the money making activity will be over since players loose faith and nobody will be willing to play again.

Why? The article just say that bots lose money over 90% of the time. You just play and pick them off. I don't any incentive NOT to play again.
 
I don't play poker online but I would imagine you open an account, connect it with a bank/credit card and for some reason, the host mistakenly identify you as a bot and all your deposit/winning/balance is gone?

Max posted earlier that the accouns are confiscated, plain and simple. I'm not sure about this but the US laws don't apply. I don't know if you can't go and sue them on a US court since there is no jurisdiction.
 
Why? The article just say that bots lose money over 90% of the time. You just play and pick them off. I don't any incentive NOT to play again.
better bots that pick you off instead of vice versa.

Having a bot is kind of like insider trading - you can calculate the odds of certain events, go from there that you may not be able to do as well if you were a player.

Lets put it this way - in a recent trading competition that I participated in, there was a marked difference between the traders that invested time to create and test models, and those that showed up and expected to just do well by default. MIT did well, our team did well... but some "top-tier" schools were in for a nasty surprise...
 
Why? The article just say that bots lose money over 90% of the time. You just play and pick them off. I don't any incentive NOT to play again.

Isn't it hard to control the amount of bets which will be won 10% of time? If it comes out to be a big amount then players are expected to complain immediately with any little doubt. Then your above post comes true. Here it is:
The site owner won't try to detect a bot unless somebody complained because they are making money from the bot as well. At that point, they can deploy the message/captcha trick.

Does such bots exist long? It is primarily depended on the control of the 10% winning amount.
 
better bots that pick you off instead of vice versa.

Having a bot is kind of like insider trading - you can calculate the odds of certain events, go from there that you may not be able to do as well if you were a player.

How are Bots like insider trading? Bots don't have any infomation that other players don't. They just do mental math better and are unemotional.
 
http://www.pokerstars.com/poker/room/prohibited/ There are few instances that i am aware of that funds were confiscated. Online poker is very competitive business. Many players have same backing arrangements, share hand histories (work of a single database), work from same location, and work together on modelling profiles of other regulars.
 
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