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Originally Posted by superdoak
Hi Guys,
Love the show, not missed an episode in at least 7/8 years.
I have an EV question about the US Lottery. Im from the UK so this may be dumb but a news article says 85.8% of combinations have been picked for the next draw. Given the recent drafkings scandal, does this mean that someone has access to what these combinations are? So could they use this to pick the numbers that havent been chosen to increase their value by having the only winning ticket?
Assuming the draw is a truly uniform distribution, the following is theoretically possible:
In a timeframe *just before the draw* they could obtain a list of unused numbers and play those. Their odds are the same, but their EV increases slightly.
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Given its odds are 1 in 292 million, there are 45 million combinations not chosen so its unlikely anyone could use this information usefully, but is the principal there of being able to check a certain combination has not been used by anyone else?
This kinda has me thinking about something else. The terminals themselves offer 'quick picks' (they generate the numbers for you). I believe most people use these. These terminals are fairly likely inexpensive, so probably use a PRNG (pseudo-random number generator) which is not uniform. I suppose a confederate with knowledge of the terminal PRNG bias, could get a similar but slightly less EV advantage.