Friday, July 07, 2017

Are Putin's Hackers into Cheating Casinos?

Putin Casino Hacking Center?
Interesting question, isn't it?

We've all heard the accusations against Russian President Vladimir Putin ordering his team of ace hackers to infiltrate the 2016 US presidential election, but as Putin is known to be hoarding billions of dollars in money he's taken in one way or another from Russian businesses and businessmen, is it far-fetched to believe that he's also ordered his hackers to infiltrate gambling casinos?

Nor just US casinos but casinos anywhere in the world.

I don't have a definitive answer for this intriguing question, but I certainly do have an opinion. And it's based on facts that link Russian hackers to casino scams in the past.

Most recently, a team of Russian hackers beat Australian casinos' pokies out of millions. They did this by using smart phones, sophisticated apps and even more sophisticated mathematical minds behind the whole thing.

This same hackers beat American casinos' poker machines out of millions back in 2014. It was noted that American poker machines were paying a lot more money to Russian players than they were taking in--even though there were no large payouts or jackpots.

It was also noted that these Russian players would always have one of their hands in a pocket or in a bag while playing small amounts of money and then seemingly winning every time they made a significantly larger bet.

In Australia they were known to be entering the pokie screen displays into their sophisticated apps.

So, was Putin giving the orders for these illicit poker-machine scams as well?

Well, your guess is as good as mine, but I will tell you this: NEVER put anything beyond Vladimir Putin.

Tuesday, July 04, 2017

New Bahamian Casino hit by major Roulette Chip-Color Scam

How much is each stack worth?
I am a bit late in reporting this as it happened two months ago in the end of April, but it is a significant piece of news in the casino-cheating world.

Two American casino cheats from Florida hit the new Baha Mar casino with the already infamous roulette chip-color scam, a scam scene quite often in the continental US but not seen before in the Caribbean as far as I know. That's to say I've read no reports about it until now.

The scam is simply to obtain a color of non-redeemable roulette chips at one roulette table and then bring them to a second roulette chip where those chips are put into play where the same color chips at the second table have a higher established value than they did at the first. It is always done with at least two cheats partnering up and in some cases a whole team.

At the Baha Mar in Nassau, one unnamed roulette chips bought in and played at the first table and then handed them off a stack of those chips to a second unnamed roulette cheat who played them at a much higher denomination than for what the first cheat had paid for. Details are sketchy, but according to Bahamian police the pair made off with $6,000 in profits due to the difference in chip denominations.

Their scam came apart when a casino employee noticed the first cheat subtly pocketing roulette chips on several occasions and then heading off to the bathroom, where he must have given them to his cohort.

The $6,000 scam proved to be quite expensive for the pair of Floridian casino cheats. A Bahamian chief magistrate listened to the two tell her that they were pressured from a third man to participate in the scam before she sentenced them to two years in prison each.

My take: Definitely a heavy sentence for a low-level/low tech casino scam. I guess sometimes even the Bahamians are not so mellow!

Monday, July 03, 2017

Is it possible to get on a real enduring Hot Streak playing Slot Machines? Without Cheating?

Sizzling-Hot Slot Machines
When gamblers talk about hot streaks in casinos, online or in brick and mortar ones, the games that often get referred to are baccarat, roulette, blackjack and  poker. I myself as a baccarat dealer recall an evening where a gentleman banker dealt 24 winning bank hands in a row. I also remember one player playing heads up blackjack on a double-deck game who ran through two double decks without losing a single hand.

But what about slot machines?

When people talk about big scores on slot machines the subject is always jackpots or rigging jackpots, which in most casino jurisdictions is a felony punishable by years in prison. You don't hear much about people saying something like, "I went on this big sizzling slot machine streak and didn't lose on a single machine in a week."

Well, maybe that's because such a statement would be impossible based on reality.

But maybe not.

Back in the day when I was cheating casinos, my team and other cheating teams hung out after hours in a Denny's restaurant in Las Vegas next to the old Dunes Hotel. There we would shoot the shit and tell war stories. One guy at another table was telling a story about an old World War One veteran who entered the Golden Nugget casino in Downtown Vegas with a single nickel.

Well, did you ever hear of the expression "His last wooden nickel?"

This old-timer's nickel was not wooden....supposedly it was steel, one of the steel nickels that were minted during World War Two because of shortages of nickel alloy at the US mint.

And that steel nickel turned into gold because the guy went on a Sizzling Hot streak hitting slot machine after slot machine for small jackpots, which led to a much bigger jackpot he hit with five silver dollars at a casino ironically called "The Mint.".

The amount of his sizzling win was more than half a million dollars...and we´re talking 1960s here!