Stars plo bot ring

On June 14 2015 23:29 Spitfiree wrote: [...]Plus how do they pass the bot security check in chat?

1. They can have some alert set up that sends them a message when something like that happens and they can solve it "by hand" from they cell phone

2. They can have a person hired who watches the programs all the time and solves problems.

3. There are already programs that passed the Turing test = a test, whether someone is a human or a machine. Its not very likely they could get their hands on those, but its not impossible. Plus programming something that passes a simple Pokerstars chat test is way more easier (eventhough still quite difficult), so they could have done that.

Wasn't Susaanin one of the bot accounts?

If so, how is he still playing???

Submitted by : Joe

PokerStars Zoom Hand #136758711498: Omaha Pot Limit ($0.50/$1.00) - 2015/06/15 19:49:01 CET [2015/06/15 13:49:01 ET]
Table Gotha 6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: Hero ($204.87 in chips)
Seat 2: SuSaaNiN ($633.52 in chips)
Seat 3: FS1337 ($159.16 in chips)
Seat 4: maxfey01 ($207.57 in chips)
Seat 5: Arsenal5015 ($81 in chips)
Seat 6: 003Mast300 ($188.34 in chips)
SuSaaNiN: posts small blind $0.50
FS1337: posts big blind $1

Holecards
Dealt to Hero
maxfey01: folds
Arsenal5015: folds
003Mast300: folds
Hero: raises $1.50 to $2.50
SuSaaNiN: raises $6 to $8.50
FS1337: folds
Hero: calls $6

Flop (Pot : $18.00)

   
SuSaaNiN: bets $12
Hero: calls $12

Turn (Pot : $42.00)

   
SuSaaNiN: bets $30
Hero: calls $30

River (Pot : $102.00)

   
SuSaaNiN: bets $66
Hero: folds
Uncalled bet ($66) returned to SuSaaNiN
SuSaaNiN collected $99.20 from pot
SuSaaNiN: doesnt show hand

Summary
Total pot $102 | Rake $2.80
Board  
Seat 1: Hero (button) folded on the River
Seat 2: SuSaaNiN (small blind) collected ($99.20)
Seat 3: FS1337 (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: maxfey01 folded before Flop (didnt bet)
Seat 5: Arsenal5015 folded before Flop (didnt bet)
Seat 6: 003Mast300 folded before Flop (didnt bet)

On June 14 2015 19:36 Joe wrote: Show nested quote + On June 14 2015 17:53 traxamillion wrote:   On June 14 2015 13:32 TalentedTom wrote:   On June 13 2015 15:05 uiCk wrote: Eliminating HUD usage will eliminate bots That's pretty much the only solution. Eliminating datamining / ability to download HH is the solution (at least for now). Eliminating common HUD's will just give those people with custom specialized software a larger edge The bots scrape the data (such as board, holecards) directly from the screen. They don't use HH. The idea isn't so much banning HUDs as it is making it impossible for them to work. If it is impossible for a hud to work on your site then it is probably impossible for a bot to play there as well, at least using conventional methods. If a human can extract some info, then a bot can too. You can just make it more difficult = more expensive, but thats it.

Apparently making this aspect manual would make multitabling much more difficult and set botting back significantly. I'm sure there would be ways around it which is why I say conventional methods. If you have no program capable of collecting the game state data that is a big problem. Not realistic to have a human manually input hole cards, bet sizes, pot sizes, etc. every single hand. Especially on more than one table.

Weird that player was definitely listed as one of the suspected bots. Thought it was banned. I'll head over to 2+2 and try to find out why it is still playing. Looks like you have some experience playing the bots. Do they balance timing and all of that pretty well? Do they play well? I understand they have a few statistical oddities such as very high flop c/r (and high turn c/r. Both the same at around 15-16%), and their 3bet % is equal to their squeeze%. That last one seems weird what exactly does that even mean? They always flat a single open but if someone coldcalls now they have a 3bet range?

I had no idea they were bots before and I played quite a bit with several of them. I mostly thought of them as solid regs.

I checked Susaanin stats:

- his X/R is definately above average, around 20% for both flop and turn (not a huge sample though, just around 1300 hands). Not sure what the average is, but I guess like 10%/8% maybe? Mine is like 13%/7%.

- his squeeze is really huge, almost 16%. Most regs dont squeeze much, definately below 5% on average.

hopefully the squeezing is strategic and not a collusion thing. I know there is a lot of collusion suspicion, bots sharing holecards in particular.

On June 14 2015 19:34 Joe wrote: I think it could be a good idea to actually open a poker room for bots. Provide a simple interface so that coders dont need to bother with low level bs like screen recognition, injection, etc. Just coding your algorithm and letting it play against others. Just like quant trading. AlgoStars

wouldn't ever really work because you can play ~10,000 hands in 5 seconds ruins the only reason people are willing to gamble on poker

I got a refund of like $26.50 or something along those lines. No mention of what it was for, but I suppose it was this. Although honestly I've barely played lately - 70hrs a week of real-life stuff that is more +EV (both long-term and short-term) has been dominating my time.

I don't mind poker, but I've always been of the philosophy that the long-term health of the games needs serious consideration from groups like Pokerstars and they show no evidence of doing so. This latest scandal is just more of the same for Online Poker it seems. It took them forever to figure out anything was even wrong.

Not only that but imagine this. If you're a zoom poker player and you have 5-15 bots running in a 100-200 player pool that can become a huge edge. Every time you are seated at the same table the bots can be organized to play normally vs. each other (not use special info). To play very well in general (using purchased databases, shared databases, for maximum utility of statistical based plays (sb vs. bb + raise vs. tight blinds + 3-bet & c-betting opponents who massively over-fold etc).

Now add to all of that the potential to know 4 additional cards a legit player doesn't and know more precisely the equity that your hand has. This is the biggest problem. Lets say those 4 cards burned zero of your draw outs. That's a massive amount of EV knowledge in a game where most of the time players are 40%-65% to win. Being able to play more aggressively and know more frequently when you're the 65% is a huge advantage.

In fact, I'm surprised I'd never thought about it before. I bet there are quite a few regs who share their hole cards after folding (over skype) so that their friend can play their equity more precisely and thus play more aggressively when appropriate. It's a massive advantage.

Emailed stars and heres the answer I got :

Hello Quentin,

Thank you for your report. Your email was escalated to me as an expert in bot detection and as a member of the PokerStars Game Integrity Team.

We are indeed aware of the online discussions alleging a group of accounts to be operating poker bots. Please rest assured that we do not tolerate such activity on PokerStars. We have an extensive arsenal of detection tools in order to ensure that each player is a human being and playing without the use of prohibited programs.

Firstly, we note that the discussions include a list of accounts that are assumed to have been closed due to lack of recent activity. We can confirm that a number of these accounts have indeed been closed for violations of our Terms of Service, but this does not hold true for every account mentioned. Due to our strict privacy policy, we are unable to disclose User IDs in the context of fraud, nor offer comment as to why accounts we might have previously investigated may not have any recent activity.

As for the numerous active accounts mentioned, we do understand the concerns surrounding their playing statistics. Our access to all hand histories on PokerStars allows us to analyse any similarities in playing statistics between these accounts, as well as every other account. However, similar playing statistics alone is not sufficient proof wrongdoing, and we must do our due diligence to ensure that the correct resolution is reached. Our investigation includes, but is not limited to, reviewing their software and playing environments, how they interact with the PokerStars client, as well as analysing their activity in real-time and conducting Turing tests.

We kindly ask for your patience while we thoroughly investigate this matter. We also recommend that the identities of suspects be reported to us directly, not only to avoid slandering potentially innocent players, but also to avoid tipping off potential offenders. If you have any further information to provide regarding this matter, we will take it into consideration.

PokerStars will advise you of the outcome of the investigation as soon as possible.

Regards

Brian
Pokerstars Game Integrity

They are suspecting the same bots to be running on Party. One of the regs is saying that he used to play a lot of 5/10 with them and that they have been around for long time (around 2 years).

We have about 15 of those NLHE bots on italian networks. They play mostly NL200-NL100 but also NL400 and NL50. They are losing at NL100 zoom, breakeven at NL200 normal and slightly losing at NL400.

When I said in chat one of these accounts is a bot he actually answered saying "bot)))))". The parenthesis are russian smile, no italian will ever say it like this. Also he tried to speak with bad italian so he's most likely a russian guy playing by a script as we suspected.

got $110 refund recently, but i didnt play any PLO. Were the russian midstakes NLHE players finally banned for cheating? I always thought they were terrible and there was no way they could win $.

Already 4-5 years ago I was getting messages in the chat and I had to give in some kind of code to assure I was not a bot. This happened sporadically and not only during 7h sessions. Were those bots able to defeat that measure so easily back in the days?

On June 19 2015 16:45 austrian oak wrote: Already 4-5 years ago I was getting messages in the chat and I had to give in some kind of code to assure I was not a bot. This happened sporadically and not only during 7h sessions. Were those bots able to defeat that measure so easily back in the days?

If it was me back then and I had you know like 10 bots or w/e running on a computer or 2, I would be sitting there doing other stuff while they played. Then if anything like that popped up while I'm say, watching TV, I could just fill it in myself.

I wonder how do you program it well enough for it to be making correct decisions and be a winner at 1/2. I'm guessing PLO games are much softer than NLHE, but still this seems like you'd need a team that has pretty deep understandings of the game to do it.
I also wonder if it could be made to just detect when the anti bot msg comes up and auto shut down itself, I remember back in the day when i was playing diablo2 there was a superb bot that scanned certain map and restarted the game if it didnt find what it needed, if they could program it to scan the chat box for example to detect the msg and just instantly quit, I doubt PS can do much about that

On June 20 2015 23:08 Spitfiree wrote: I wonder how do you program it well enough for it to be making correct decisions and be a winner at 1/2. I'm guessing PLO games are much softer than NLHE, but still this seems like you'd need a team that has pretty deep understandings of the game to do it. I also wonder if it could be made to just detect when the anti bot msg comes up and auto shut down itself, I remember back in the day when i was playing diablo2 there was a superb bot that scanned certain map and restarted the game if it didnt find what it needed, if they could program it to scan the chat box for example to detect the msg and just instantly quit, I doubt PS can do much about that

I think it's the fact that equities run a lot closer and that with 2 bots at the same table in PLO you know 4 hole cards rather than the 2 of NLHE which gives a much bigger advantage.

--- Nuked ---

On June 20 2015 23:08 Spitfiree wrote: I wonder how do you program it well enough for it to be making correct decisions and be a winner at 1/2. I'm guessing PLO games are much softer than NLHE, but still this seems like you'd need a team that has pretty deep understandings of the game to do it. I also wonder if it could be made to just detect when the anti bot msg comes up and auto shut down itself, I remember back in the day when i was playing diablo2 there was a superb bot that scanned certain map and restarted the game if it didnt find what it needed, if they could program it to scan the chat box for example to detect the msg and just instantly quit, I doubt PS can do much about that

Haven't kept up since I've been on vacation, but as far as I know, the suspicion seems to be more along the lines of a program that basically tells you what to do in situations rather than a fully automatized bot.

Also I dont think they are suspected of hole card sharing, which makes it scarier that they are all such huge winners.

It's funny how a lot of those guys I used to think were horrible spewtards, but in the past year have become really tough (and above all consistent). Kinda scary that they are bots/bot-assisted, thought they'd just worked real hard or something.

On June 27 2015 08:19 TianYuan wrote: Show nested quote + On June 20 2015 23:08 Spitfiree wrote: I wonder how do you program it well enough for it to be making correct decisions and be a winner at 1/2. I'm guessing PLO games are much softer than NLHE, but still this seems like you'd need a team that has pretty deep understandings of the game to do it. I also wonder if it could be made to just detect when the anti bot msg comes up and auto shut down itself, I remember back in the day when i was playing diablo2 there was a superb bot that scanned certain map and restarted the game if it didnt find what it needed, if they could program it to scan the chat box for example to detect the msg and just instantly quit, I doubt PS can do much about that Haven't kept up since I've been on vacation, but as far as I know, the suspicion seems to be more along the lines of a program that basically tells you what to do in situations rather than a fully automatized bot. Also I dont think they are suspected of hole card sharing, which makes it scarier that they are all such huge winners. It's funny how a lot of those guys I used to think were horrible spewtards, but in the past year have become really tough (and above all consistent). Kinda scary that they are bots/bot-assisted, thought they'd just worked real hard or something.

that is terrifying if true

from 2p2 lol