Yes, of course. Poker sites use many hardware/software ways to snoop on you.

tbh all seems pritty obvious, i wouldnt have bothered posting

You did bother to make this brilliant post, though.

Why is OP banned? I guess it's unrelated, but you never know. Even gtpitch can become a mod soon

Even though I stopped playing a Full Tilt a while back, the fact they use ieSnare is a bit unsettling. I realize it's used as "fraud prevention" or whatever. Other than that I really don';t know much about it. The disturbing part is this was developed by iovation and I believe Greg Pierson, whose name came up numerous times in the last Ultimatebet scandal. I'm not saying there is anything sinister about it.

It would be nice if some of the more knowledgeable posters could elaborate on exactly what iesnare is capable of doing.

That is absurd. This would only speed up the time before bots become profitable since they can do massive tests of what works and what doesn't without the cubersome process of being detected/banned/having to create new accounts.

It is in the sites long run interest to make life as hard as possible for botters.

People can do tests as much as they want already. There are also good testbeds for that (like Poker Academy). What is a massive test anyway, if no multi-accounting is enforced as I suggested?

4) If you use PT3/HM/etc they will inject dll to FTP client, and send stuff to sockets, another flag


Can someone pls explain this to me ?

Anyone can give me a short answer if that means, FTP can detect via screenshots wether you use observed HHs in your HUD or not?

I felt really safe doing this so far, cause everyone who playes seriously does this, or as to say i dont know anyone who is not using observed HHs. If so i should instantly cancel my HH subscription.

in theory they can

So , does this prevent you or anyone from using obsereved HHs atm?

There is a huge difference between AI and human players. If botters want to use poker academy they can do so, but I don't want them to run live tests on the tables I am playing against the casual players I am playing. If people currently break the rules that are in place against multi accounting, do you seriously expect if you allowed botters they would respect a ban against multi accounting? That is naive.

There is zero reason for any poker player to want bots in the game. It lessens the faith people have in the game. It will in the long run make the fish lose money faster.

I don't use observed HHs anymore as i play headsup exclusively. You use observed HHs at your own risks on sites that don't allow it. I don't think they're that useful anyways, apart for table selection. So I'd say it's not worth the risk or effort. Moreover, there is no doubt that you're gaining an unfair advantage and that it's morally wrong to do so. Although prob. not as much as other things people do.

Q1. If there were 3 poker sites, one that welcomed bots and two reserved for humans, where would the humans play?

Q2. If there were 3 poker sites, two used almost exclusively by humans and one used almost exclusively by bots, which sites would the bot masters rather play?

Q3. Imagine a world where all poker sites allowed bots, where a site could gain a competitive advantage by banning bots (attracting more human players, and bots too). Why would no site act to take that competitive advantage - unless there was active (and illegal) anti-competitive collusion between the companies responsible?

Clearly, with no commercial incentive to move from a bot-hostile business model to a bot-friendly business model (but a commercial incentive to move from a bot-friendly to a bot-hostile business model) bots will not be welcome.

Cliff Notes
Ban the bots

I don't know more about this than a few minutes of googling gave me, but:

ieSnare is sold as a service called ReputationManager by Iovation.
http://www.iovation.com/fraud-management/
http://www.iovation.com/images/pdf/r...manager_ds.pdf

It gives your computer a unique identifier that's stored in Iovation's database. Any subscriber to the service can check what info is linked to this identifier. This info includes, at the very least,

- other identifiers associated with yours. Other computers that have logged into the same account. If you log into your online bank on a friends computer, FTP will know that your friend's computer is associated with you, assuming your bank uses ReputationManager.

- other subscriber's notes on you. If FTP bans you for suspected collusion, your bank will know. "For example, when processing a financial transaction, a subscriber can query for evidence of prior fraud or identity theft while ignoring other types of evidence, such as chat abuse or spam.", meaning the subscriber can filter out your chat bans if they really want to.

I'm not sure based on the info given if it shows what other subscribers your identifier is linked to. Does your bank know you play on FTP unless FTP suspects you of cheating? It would be interesting to mail sales@iovation.com and pretend to be a banner ad server wanting to use their db for targeted advertising.

They claim not to store any personally identifiable information, meaning they don't know your name, ssn, Paypal account etc. Obviously FTP knows who you are when querying your info.

so what ur saying is that Poker sites can look at my hole cards anytime they want?

you might be missing the point here...

You sound like you're simply trying to justify this to yourself. Not everyone does this. You're way wrong unless you're going to come back and say if the ydon't do this then they're not a serious player in the first place.

You remind me of the people before the big napster bust who were saying "everybody does it" and then a bunch of people got taken to court for file sharing and some were hit with large fines and more.

Some serious players don't even use HUDs.

You seem to know well the psychology of botters, how come that? (To clarify to all: most, at least majority of the botters prefer botting to be viewed cheating, as they believe that they make more money if botting is not allowed).

Now the answer to your questions. I would suggest as a first step to have a (big) site that allows bots - and marks them as bots. Or have only some tables where bots are allowed. This will not limit or restrict anyone in what he does right now, but enable bot hobbyists to try and compete in building a better bot for money. And then lets see how it goes from there.

What I can tell is that in my experience most of the botters nowadays are losing (donating) money. The ratio is pretty much as the one for human players. It's more complex to build (and maintain) a winning bot, than to become a winning poker player.

Of course they can.

If a site can take a screenshot while you are playing, why can't the site compare the HUD hand # stats around the table(s) against the number of hands they know you've played and bust/get rid of people who buy hand histories by the millions?

I'm not a programmer nor an IT pro, but this seems rather simple. Correct me if I'm wrong but I've never heard of a poker site doing this.

Very good idea indeed. Sites should implement this.

Thanks. It's frustrating - all I want is a staight-up game.

You thanked the right guy then.

Sorry, low-numbers guy here. Did I just step in it?