Casino Insider Tells (Almost) All About Security

An anonymous reader writes "ComputerWorld has up a story on casino security technology, exploring the world of facial recognition technology and various other systems in casinos such as the Bellagio, Treasure Island, and Beau Rivage. Industry veteran Jeff Jonas reveals some of the secret scams he learned from the casino industry such as the infinite hundred dollar bill, the hollowed out chip cup, the palm (trading cards), the specialty code (inserted by rogue programmer into video poker machine) and the cameraman, as well as detailing how casinos strike back against fraudsters and cheats.'"

Comments

3rd page

[Telvin_3d]

For some odd reason, the submitter has linked to the third page of a three page article. To no one's surprise, the editors did not catch this. Here is the link to page 1
http://www.computerworld.com.au/index.php/id;270726757;pp;1;fp;4194304;fpid;1

Re:3rd page

[ElizabethGreene]

Network World has the article as well, since the poor .au site has just developed emotional issues from the stampede of slashdotters.

Link

Re:Untrue

[MobileMrX]

Blackjack's odds are almost never (if ever) in the favor of the player, unless the player is counting cards.

For reference: http://wizardofodds.com/blackjack/house-edge-calculator.html

That calculates the house's odds. Even if you give every advantage to the player, the house still has the advantage if they are using more than one deck (which is almost always). So even in perfect player conditions, the house still has to be using only one deck for the player to have any advantage.

Re:Untrue

[EastCoastSurfer]

Those who do understand the odds tend to either play games like blackjack which is the only game in the casino which has positive odds

Positive odds is only true if you are counting cards and are good at it. Even if you play blackjack perfectly the casino still has the odds favor. See here.

People who understand odds aren't playing blackjack, but craps. Properly played craps has the lowest house advantage than any other game in the casino. Plus it's actually fun! Every time I go to LV I play craps at Casino Royale. It's a crappy casino, but they have the lowest house advantage that I've found. In fact this chart shows I'm at the right place :)

Re:Casino security is neat.

[Lumpy]

This curious dork got a contract to install 12 Panasonic 42" plasmas for signage out of the whole thing. They called me because I left a card with him and he passed it on as a "this guy is trustworthy" gesture, it also helped that I got to meet the Operations manager that night as well and talked for a while.

So I made some nice coin on the deal of being a "dork". I need to be a "dork" more often :)

BTW: notice how casinos only really use Panasonic Commercial Plasmas? it's because the digital signage module plugs into the set's backplane. It's a all in one solution without any additional "crap" run a cat5, plug the set into the network, and it's all done... I can even do a video wall with 12-16 sets without buying a controller as the set's will do it all for me.

Re:waiting for the MIT movie

[DoubleMike]

I read the book.

I read the book, and I'm pretty sure you didn't, or at least you didn't get past chapter two. The MIT team DID use card counting most of the time, and only used the super-hard tricky stuff when they just wanted to have a little fun.

This is harder to track than card counting, because you play normally most hands, just bet big (and somewhat out of character, which helped lead to their downfall) every once in a while and win big.

Again, completely wrong. That was exactly what the team was trying to avoid. A big bet after a bunch of small ones really stands out and makes you look suspicious. What they did was have one player bet small and count cards until the odds shifted to favor the player, then they signaled the "big player" to come in and bet big to take advantage of the better odds.

The one thing that struck me most in reading the book is that they really never understood human nature, specifically humans working for the casino. They kept on saying "well, we're not cheating" and expected there to be no problems. ... They seemed totally unaware of the dangers they faced, physically.

I'm not sure which book you read, but it wasn't the right one. The MIT team understood human nature extremely well, and exploited it to make their scheme undetectable. They knew what kind of players bet big, so they imitated those characters. Their card counters were usually some hot blonde that no-one would ever suspect, and no-one did. They also knew the law, and they weren't "cheating". They knew the dangers, and always, always had a plan B. They were literally taught the people who discovered the dangers firsthand when they were interrogated forcefully by casino security (back in the 70's-80's). They had scouts and knew the quickest way out of the building, in case casino management decided they weren't welcome. The only reason they were ever caught is because someone ratted them out, and then everything changed because they were no longer allowed in any casino (by the casinos, not the law). Once they were forcefully retired, they did the smart thing and published their story, making even more money.