Someone Figured Out Two Plus Two

Like most of you, I’ve noticed the popular Two Plus Two forums went offline yesterday afternoon, having fallen victim to a hacker who “has displayed the ability to access e-mail addresses and encrypted passwords” as well as “the ability to decrypt passwords” (to quote from 2+2’s statement on the matter).

The site was taken offline as a precaution, with 2+2 advising users that if they happened to use their password for the forums for other accounts, they should change them as the hacker potentially has that info. NoahSD published a helpful post on his blog yesterday afternoon discussing the situation and providing advice.

The forums have been down for over 24 hours now, which means just about everybody who frequents them has become aware. The situation reminds me of that little brouhaha that erupted just about a year ago -- in late March, just before Black Friday -- which inspired a lot of talk about 2+2’s true significance to the poker community.

At issue was the revelation of still more questionable information regarding the insider cheating scandal (and subsequent cover-up) at UltimateBet. You might recall how during the first weeks of 2011, Joe Sebok -- at the time still a sponsored pro as well as UB Media and Operations Consultant -- was stirring things up a bit with interviews as well as some wars over Twitter. Coupled with some other new revelations about UB, the clamoring for answers was starting to become louder, with some wanting in particular to hear what UB’s COO Paul Leggett had to say about it all.

That’s when 2+2 “Grand Poobah” Mason Malmuth suggested in a thread that if Leggett were to come forward to address any questions, “He should answer them here,” since “2+2 is where the poker community is.”

That suggestion of 2+2’s centrality to the poker community -- or, perhaps even that 2+2 was “the poker community” -- got a lot of response, including many pointing out that the poker community includes a lot of people who have little or nothing to do with the forums, among other rejoinders.

I wrote a post here at the time in which I noted that in poker we really have multiple, overlapping communities (plural). I also got a little abstract and talked about how the whole idea of “community” in sometimes hard to imagine in poker given how the game necessarily pits us all against one other.

I suppose the longer 2+2 stays offline, the more its significance within the poker community will be clarified to us. It isn’t hard to imagine us all congregating somewhere else to share news, spread rumors, discuss strategy, insult and troll, earn warnings and bans, and imagine different scenarios in which Phil Hellmuth would ride a giant hot dog on water.

Then again, since Black Friday a lot of us have been wandering around somewhat detached from “the” poker community for many months now. Could make it that harder to get back together....

I expect 2+2 will be back soon enough, though. Which is good, ’cause I don’t have time to keep making my own photoshops.

Security Leakin’, of SCOOP Speakin’, and C’mon, Everybody We’re Going Streakin’!

Was busy delivering the scoop on SCOOP again last night (and this morning), and so once again am running low on mental fuel this afternoon.

If I did, I might’ve written something about the latest shenanigans at Cereus -- there’s been yet another security issue over there -- but as I say I haven’t the energy at the moment to do so. Just as well, really, as all I’d have to add would be to reiterate my distaste with Cereus, to recommend new players avoid signing up at UB or Absolute Poker, and perhaps to laugh a little at the absurdity of it all.

In other words, to join in the (deserved) piling on.

For those unfamiliar, click here to read the original report over on Poker Table Ratings of the vulnerability at Cereus concerning their encryption mechanism. (There are follow-up pieces over on PTR as well, if you click around.) You might also see UB.com COO Paul Leggett’s initial response to the news, of which he says he’s “very shocked” to learn. And here is UB.com spokesperson and media & operations consultant Joe Sebok’s note on the matter, too -- not posted on his UB.com blog (yet?) but rather over on PokerRoad.

As I said, was pretty much solely occupied with writing up several different SCOOP events here of late. Here’s how I spent the last 24 hours or so, if you’re curious:

In Event No. 24-Medium, the $109 buy-in Deuce-to-Seven Triple Draw event, Buckeye 119 took it down. Team PokerStars pro Pat Pezzin had chips deep in this one, but finished 14th, thereby thwarting my opportunity to have built a headline around the phrase “Standing Pat.” Also some funny chat reported here, thanks to the appropriately-named player Needleking.

In Event No. 25-High, the $2,100 buy-in Stud/8 event, Gunslinger3 took it down, ultimately outlasting Team PokerStars Pro George Lind III to do so.

And in Event No. 26-Low, an $11 NLHE event, *guerillaz* carried the day, coming out on top of a huge, 16,498 player field. Tourney ended on a crushing bad beat for runner-up fysass1881. Post contains an utterly appropriate reference to Frank the Tank’s “We’re goin’ streakin’!” scene in Old School.

Nice little series they’re putting on over there at Stars. Not so little, actually. A decent poker site, I’d say. Definitely a better choice than some sites, if yr lookin’ for somewheres to play.

The Sebok Surprise

Yesterday I was at the bank making a deposit. Was the middle of the afternoon, and when I walked in there were no other customers and three tellers seemingly having a good time at their jobs, all smiling and joking around a bit. I handed the one my check and deposit slip, and after looking it over she took it to be approved by a supervisor.

While the supervisor was signing off on it, the teller, still with a smile on her face, startled me a little by asking me the following question: “What is one belief you have about human nature?”

I’m not making this up. I smiled and asked jokingly whether the question was part of the approval process for my check. She chuckled and said no, they were doing a poll. Indeed, her colleagues were looking over at us, awaiting my reply to the question.

I thought for a moment, then came up with an answer. “All are interested in survival,” I said. “That’s good,” one of the other tellers said, nodding. Then I made another joke about how when I sign into my account online, I always struggle to remember the answers to those ID questions such as “What was your first car?” I said I was glad that I wasn’t asked about human nature there, because I’d never remember what my answer was.

My check was approved, and the teller humorously said “Thanks for your belief” as I left.

It was a little later that I was reading online about Joe Sebok having signed on to represent UltimateBet. Again, like the teller’s question, not expected. I have to admit, at first I thought the story might have been a Melted Felt-style satire, but a little more surfing around confirmed that indeed, Sebok had made the move. In fact, not only is he now a UB-sponsored player, but he’s also taken a position as a “media and operations consultant.”

It appears the signing of Sebok isn’t intended as just another addition of a poker pro to the roster, but a non-ambiguous public-relations move coming on the heels of that, well, still somewhat ambiguous “final decision” from the Kahnawake Gaming Commission regarding the insider cheating that occurred at UB.

As the report noted, folks on the inside cheated players for four-and-a-half years (from June 2003 to December 2007), a period that was followed by another twenty months of less-than-forthright communications with players and others regarding the status of the investigation that for many further damaged the site’s credibility and integrity.

The UB press release is headlined “Respected Poker Pro Joe Sebok Joins UltimateBet’s Team UB” -- a pretty clear signal that the signing is attempt to improve the current respectability of the site. The release goes on to say that in his new role Sebok “will help bridge the gap between the UltimateBet brand and poker players.”

Interestingly, the press release also suggests that an announcement regarding those mysterious 31 unnamed players implicated in the cheating scandal is imminent. Says Sebok, “UB and I first started talking about a possible relationship almost 4 months ago and I made it very clear that I couldn’t commit until that point in time when the names associated with the scandal began to be released.”

In other words, it sounds like Sebok’s signing was based in part on a agreement that UB would eventually release the names of everyone -- in addition to the already-named Russ Hamilton -- “associated with the scandal.” That would seem to indicate both those guilty of fraud and those merely “associated” will be identified. As some have speculated, the 31 names may well include some of both -- that is, some who were actively involved in the cheating and some who were “associated” in some less-culpable fashion. One wonders if it really is feasible for all 31 to be identified here, but that’s what is being suggested will happen.

Sebok goes on to say that UltimateBet COO Paul Leggett has assured him that those names will be released. “I consider this [i.e., the releasing of the names] to be one of my new responsibilities moving forward,” says Sebok, “and intend to continue working very closely with Paul to ensure it happens.”

I’ve noted here before that I’m a Sebok fan, having listened to his podcasts since he first joined CardPlayer’s The Circuit some three years ago, and continued to follow his shows and the impressive growth of the PokerRoad site he founded with his father, Barry Greenstein. (To give credit, that picture of Sebok above at the 2009 WSOP comes from the PokerRoad site, taken by B.J. Nemeth -- click the pic to enlarge.) Got to meet him and talk a few times this past summer when covering the WSOP, and found him as friendly and funny as you’d expect from the shows.

I am remembering shaking Sebok’s hand after he busted from the Main Event on Day 7, finishing in 56th place. As I reported here at the time, pretty much everyone on the rail, particularly the media folks, was pulling for the guy.

I am also remembering back during the 2008 WSOP when another pro whom I respect and like, Eric “Rizen” Lynch, signed with UB, and writing a post here lamenting his decision. (Lynch, of course, soon afterward changed his mind and parted ways with UB.)

It’s true that the situation at UB was somewhat different then than now, but I can’t help but feel a little bit of the same disappointment at the news of Sebok joining with UB. But I’m not going with the obvious “Say It Ain’t So, Joe” headline for this post. I want all of this to work out well for Sebok, for UltimateBet, and for the online poker industry as a whole.

I’m not terribly optimistic, though. Feel a little like I’m sweating Sebok in a tourney. He’s showing me his cards, and just now has decided to limp in from early position with a not-so-good hand. The button raises, it folds back to Sebok and he just calls. Maybe Sebok has a read on the situation and knows what he’s doing. And how to make this hand work. But watching from the rail, it isn’t obvious yet how that’s going to happen.

And so I fear that rather than increase UB’s respectability, Sebok’s well-earned respectability -- like a big stack of chips accumulated through a long stretch of good play -- might suffer a bit here. We’ll see, though.

One has to imagine that UltimateBet offered a pretty sweet deal to the Cub. Details of these things aren’t generally made public knowledge, but the gossip has been that UB’s deals have tended to be larger than those offered by other sites here lately (for obvious reasons). And I suppose that added “media and operations consultant” tag must have required a little extra cabbage as well.

I thought back to my answer to the teller’s question about human nature. If it is true that we are all interested in survival, then, well, I guess I probably shouldn’t be too judgmental about someone taking an opportunity like this, especially if it is (as I suspect) a somewhat lucrative one.

Still doesn’t prevent me from worrying about how it all plays out, though.

Final Decision on UltimateBet: None of My Business

On Friday, the Kahnawake Gaming Commission -- the entity that “is empowered to regulate and control gaming and gaming related activities conducted within and from the Mohawk Territory of Kahnawake [near Quebec, Canada] in accordance with the highest principles of honesty and integrity” -- issued its “final decision” regarding the cheating that occurred at UltimateBet, one of the sites to which the KGC issues a license (and thus purports to regulate and control).

Friday’s news comes nearly a year after we last heard from the KGC, and about 20 months after a few online players first began publicizing their suspicions that cheating might be happening on the site.

Turns out at least 31 different people -- in addition to 1994 WSOP Main Event champion and UltimateBet “consultant” Russ Hamilton -- were involved in the cheating at UB. And those guys had over 100 separate accounts with which to have their fun (click on list to enlarge). Over $22 million has now been refunded to affected players, and the KGC has further fined UB $1.5 million. The KGC says it believes “criminal behavior” has taken place, and so is providing information to law enforcement authorities, although whether any sort of prosecution will follow remains to be seen.

According to Friday’s report, this applesauce went on at UltimateBet for a period of four-and-a-half years -- from June 2003 to December 2007. If you’ve been paying attention, the UB cheating era keeps getting lengthier (and involves more cheaters) with each report. Back in May 2008, Tokwiro Enterprises, the company that owns UltimateBet (and Absolute Poker), reported that the “fraudulent activity” on UB first began in March 2006. The last time we heard from the KGC back in September 2008, we were told that “multiple cheating incidents” started to occur on UltimateBet in May 2004.

Since this is the “final decision,” I imagine the UB cheating era won’t be extending back any further. Couldn’t go back too much further, I guess -- UB only went online in 2001.

I’m glad the KGC has at last made its “final decision” public. I’m glad efforts are being made to try to make the criminals pay for their deeds, although am skeptical those efforts will get very far. I’m glad that the KGC has audited and approves of the operation of Tokwiro Enterprises, and has also audited and approves of the Cereus Poker Network system on which both Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet presently run.

Of course, it took a bunch of players noticing a player named “NioNio” was enjoying a statistically improbable run of good fortune on UB -- not the Kahnawake Gaming Commission, despite its being “empowered to regulate and control” the sites to which it issues licenses -- for the cheating by 30-plus other individuals on the site to be discovered. And, it appears, eventually stopped.

Not so glad about that.

Tokwiro took over ownership of UB in October 2006, and Friday’s report further details how the new owners became aware of the cheating, reported it to the KGC, and aided KGC with the investigation. The new report confirms the previous statement made by Paul Leggett, CEO of Tokwiro, that “this cheating occurred on our site through illicit software placed on the UB servers prior to our purchasing UltimateBet” and “that Tokwiro and its entire management team had no knowledge of the illicit software until it was revealed by our investigation; and no one associated with Tokwiro was involved in the cheating scheme at any point.”

Fine. The new owners are clean, although they were in charge for over a year before recognizing that a gang of folks using over 100 different usernames were cheating the site. And again, such recognition only arriving after some players started to notice and complain.

When that happened -- in January 2008 -- we had just heard from the KGC regarding the Absolute Poker cheating scandal that took place in 2007. There it was concluded that cheating had occurred at AP for a period of about six weeks during the late summer of 2007. Multiple user accounts were identified as having been involved in the cheating, “with players using software that enabled the viewing of the ‘hole cards’ of each of the other players.” Not exactly what happened at UB, apparently, according to the “Anatomy of the Cheating” section of the new report, but practically speaking very similar. The suckers playing with these cheaters were playing with their cards face up.

Absolute Poker was fined $500,000 and placed on a two-year probation by the KGC, a probation which involved the KGC conducting random audits of AP. By then, I had already abandoned Absolute Poker as a place to play, having pulled my money off the site in October 2007. I had an account over at UltimateBet at the time as well, and realizing that the same company ran both sites, I soon removed my funds from UB, too, in November (though not without some headache) -- that is, even before the NioNio thing came to light and (eventually) we all began to realize the UB scandal was much, much bigger in scope than what had happened at Absolute Poker.

So I was no longer playing on UltimateBet when the site acknowledged in March 2008 that a cheating “scheme” had been detected on the site via an “interim statement” sent to various poker industry folks. Nor was I a couple of months later when players began uncovering a number of other usernames that appeared to be involved in the cheating. Nor in September 2008 when the KGC issued its “initial findings” on the UB matter.

Nor in November 2008 when that “60 Minutes” story about the scandals appeared along with accompanying features in The Washington Post. Nor in December 2008 when UltimateBet spokesperson Phil Hellmuth was shipped a pot despite holding the worst hand, about which he said afterward (on the 12/28/09 episode of The Ultimate Poker Show) “this has happened 100 times.”

Like I say, I made my decision long ago. Am a bit incredulous, I guess, that an online poker site can manage to abuse its customers so badly for so long -- not to mention negatively affect the reputation of the industry as a whole -- and still be endorsed. And attract players.

But that’s none of my business.

Ultimate Coincidence

I know I said I didn’t want to write about UltimateBet for a while. But, really. This is too much.

First, though, I want to report I had a fun time yesterday helping out with the live blog for the Main Event of the World Blogger Championship of Online Poker.

Kind of a manic little tourney they had there, with 369 players getting whittled down to one in about six hours or so. The levels were just 10 minutes each, so it didn’t take too long -- about two-and-a-half hours -- to get down to 100 players and the “money” (i.e., the various Step tickets & tourney entries most of the winners received). Just a half-hour later they were down to 50. Then about an hour or so after that they were down to the final table. The FT went relatively quickly, too, except for heads up which ended up stretching over 100 hands.

I didn’t know any of the players who made it to the endgame, but I did know several others who qualified for yesterday’s Main Event. It was fun following my buds, for sure, including (but not limited to) Easycure, gadzooks64, Haley, heffmike, Luckbox, OhCaptain, the Poker Grump, the Poker Shrink, and the Spaceman. There were others whom I know who I’m pretty sure were in there somewhere (F-Train?), though I don’t know their screen names. And a couple more buds I know were playing but I’m not sure want to be identified as having played.

The live blog is fun to do. I think that overall we did a good job with it, and I know the players involved get a kick out of it, too. Kind of an added bonus from PokerStars for playing in the suckers.

Of course, when the tourney is that fast-paced it gets a little crazy trying to report everything accurately and in a timely fashion. The fact that it is an online tourney -- meaning every detail of every hand is usually fairly easy to recover -- kind of cuts both ways. One wants to be complete and precise, but there simply isn’t time to report everything. Thus will the occasional glitch occur, but I guess that isn’t any different from what happens at a live event, too.

Speaking of the occasional glitch, speculation continues regarding that weird limit hold’em hand that happened on UltimateBet-slash-Cereus early Saturday morning in which Phil Hellmuth was awarded a pot in which he had the worst hand. If you haven’t heard about that, see my post from Saturday, “Honey, I Was Supposed to Lose That Hand!”

And yeah, there is an actual cologne out there called Cereus. (Not affiliated with the funny-smelling online poker network.)

Apparently Cereus cologne (also released earlier this year, coincidentally) is being marketed toward “affluent men aged 35 and older.” I am not making this up.

In that suspicious LHE hand from Saturday morning, Hellmuth made it to the river with ten-deuce (sooted) on a board of J-K-K-2-9 versus a player named DOUBLEBALLER who held K-Q. However, despite the fact that DOUBLEBALLER had the better hand at showdown, the $5,599 pot somehow got shipped to the Poker Brat.

Greylocks points out that what happened very likely was not, technically speaking, a “glitch,” since that term implies the event was an aberration that won’t be repeated. Indeed, in his UB blog post, UltimateBet COO Paul Leggett described what happened as a “software malfunction,” not a “glitch.” He also says this is the “first incident of this kind we have encountered.”

Greylocks suggests what we have here is more likely a “bug” (my word) or problem that may well occur again (if it hasn’t already). Some of the posters over on the still-growing thread on Two Plus Two are also making similar arguments, amid all of the less persuasive conspiracies being put forth.

I’m no techie, but it does seem like there has to have been some sort of connection between the software incorrectly awarding Hellmuth the pot and the weird pop-up message DOUBLEBALLER saw that said he’d been disconnected and missed three blinds, even though (as far as he knew) he had remained connected the entire time. It sounds like the program indeed got its signals crossed in there somewhere, thus causing the mistake.

Of course, the fact that this “first incident of this kind we have encountered” happened during a hand involving Hellmuth makes all of this especially intriguing. One hell of a coincidence, there, wouldn’t you say?

We’d like to assume that when Hellmuth plays on UB the software is exactly the same as when anyone else logs on, but here we have an incident occurring that at the very least makes us wonder whether that is the case. And -- it goes without saying -- such an incident inevitably brings to mind those special (or “super-user”) accounts that facilitated the cheating on Absolute Poker and UltimateBet in the past.

Not necessarily looking to fuel the conspiracy fires here. (It really does appear to be a software mistake that could have occurred no matter who was playing.)

But, really. This is too much!