Man Arrested For Exploiting Error In Slot Machines

An anonymous reader writes "A man awaiting trial in Pennsylvania was arrested by Federal agents on Jan. 4, and accused of exploiting a software 'glitch' within slot machines in order to win payouts. The exploit may have allowed the man to obtain more than a million dollars from casinos in Pennsylvania and Nevada, and officials say they are investigating to see if he used the method elsewhere. The accused stated that 'I'm being arrested federally for winning on a slot machine. Let everybody see the surveillance tapes. I pressed buttons on the machine on the casino. That's all I did.' Apparently, slot machine software errors are fairly common. The lesson here seems to be that casinos can deny you a slot machine win any time they wish by claiming software errors, and if you find an error that you can exploit, you may find yourself facing Federal charges for doing so."

Comments

double standard

[v1]

I suppose the most glaring issue here is the double standard that software errors can be legally taken advantage of by the casinos, while they are illegal to take advantage of by the gambler. (or at least that looks like how the recent verdicts have been swinging)

Re:double standard

[Daengbo]

The house always wins. Duh!

Re:double standard

[Rough3dg3]

I'm not sure it's a double standard when you compare software glitches to a professional con. These guys developed a plan, hired another man in an attempt to decrease attention to the fact they were robbing a slot machine.

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

Last year I joined (and left) a major manufacturer of slot machines. I was hired as R&D manager and I was absolutely terrified when I saw how things were done. No good software development practices, their concept of version management was dumping source on a network share, the previous manager was the only one using a VCS and was for his private use, and the code was absolutely disappointing to say the least. The bad practices were so deeply marked on them that things were taken to a new facility, with an entire new team that I personally interviewed and trained them from the start, people that still didn't have any of the bad habits the old team had. Eventually I left because whoever was above me was far worse and I soon realized the company was off to die, because top level management were the ones that messed up in the first place and were about to destroy the company by killing all R&D and training and having the new team do sustained engineering on the bad code produced by the old team. This is the state of the gambling industry.

Re:double standard

[pwizard2]

Are we really surprised? There are very few games in a casino where the house doesn't have a significant advantage. The house wants you to lose money because their business model depends on it. They only pay out winnings to keep people coming back. The whole gambling industry (including lotteries) is nothing more than a system of wealth redistribution. The rich love casinos (if they own the place) because it makes money for them and the government loves casinos because it means more tax revenue. Everyone else loses.

Re:double standard

[NevarMore]

Why aren't you telling the gaming commission about this?

Re:double standard

[StikyPad]

I'd say the most glaring issue is that this article appears right above one about hackers manipulating the stock market. Since we all seem to be gambling, any bets on which "hacker" will see jail time?

Re:double standard

[YoshiDan]

He STOLE and he's being charged with it. Just because there was something wrong with the software in the machine doesn't excuse what he did.

Re:double standard

[poetmatt]

I'd say nevar has a point on this, bigtime.

Re:double standard

[The End Of Days]

You know, if it were a patent, Slashdotters would be crying about how it's not different because it's "on a computer" but once it's a crime...

Funny, that.

Re:double standard

[Threni]

YOU'RE going to be paying for his trial and incarceration, because he made use of software errors to profit from a company which profits from other people's gambling. Why? Isn't this the free market at work? If it's a problem, then fix the machines. Or...don't fix them - I don't give a shit how much money you lose from using shitty software. Good luck to him; he may have broken the law, but he's done nothing wrong.

Re:double standard

[CitizenCain]

And what would he say? It's not like the abysmal state of security on electronic gambling machines is new news, and evidently, no one cares enough to do anything about it. (And why would they when you can just have the feds arrest anyone who profits from flawed code and sieze their assets anyway?) Being stupid isn't a crime, and horrible practices for writing code aren't against gaming commission rules. No, being smart is against the rules and profiting off of crappy code (as a "gambler"/player) is a crime. Three cheers for the land of the free and our awesome justice system. :/

Re:double standard

[geekoid]

Its' the state of that particular company.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Common knowledge: slot machines are there so you can empty your pockets into them and then walk away with nothing.

Anyone using them outside of this intended purpose is going to deeply offend the mafia bosses who run the casinos, which have the cops in their pockets.

This is precisely why legalizing gambling is always an uphill battle.

Re:double standard

[Kitkoan]

Because the Gaming Commission isn't really interested hear this information. Its like the Diebold voting machines during elections. They were known to be faulty, documented to be faulty and had been warned many times that they are faulty and should never be used because of all the issues and problems that had. And they were used multiple times in multiple voting situations. At the end of the day they are more concerned in who is paying their fee's and not how it effects the public.

Re:double standard

[spun]

He's done nothing wrong? Hmm, what is your street address? You DO realize that your security has a flaw, right? Lock bumping makes it trivially easy for me to break in to your house and take your stuff. Not to mention, I bet you have your windows made of glass. Obviously, you won't mind if I use your security errors to profit from you, right? You do? Isn't this the free market at work? If it's a problem, buy a better lock. If you don't buy a better lock, I'm justified in taking your stuff.

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

I could, but:

1) what gaming commission? The company is spread around the world, with the first team of programmers being in a country one ocean away from the second, that was set up in my country. And in my country we couldn't even sell or explore the machines, just develop them.

2) don't forget that before machines can operate in a particular country they have to pass the analysis of that country's gambling commissions or certification companies and they must have access to the entire process, including source code. For some reason, this particular company didn't have a single machine in the USA for several years.

3) what the hell would I say? "hey, the company that hired me to save it from itself had bad practices before I joined it"?

Re:double standard

[icebraining]

George Carlin later apologized, but I think it's one of the cases where "truth hurts".

People who go to Las Vegas, you've got to question their fucking intellect to start with. Traveling hundreds and thousands of miles to essentially give your money to a large corporation is kind of fucking moronic. That's what I'm always getting here is these kind of fucking people with very limited intellects.

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

Actually, he doesn't. First there is nothing I can say to the gambling commission. To which commission would I complain? Of which country? The countries where the company develops machines or the countries where the company explores or sells them? What would I say exactly? I was there and did my best, enforcing completely different policies, imposing coding and formatting standards, building an appropriate IT infrastructure from scratch and training each of the new hires after having them go through hell before I decided whether they would deserve the job or not.
Besides, I'm pretty sure it was/is not my job to do such a thing. Gaming commissions exist for a purpose, they are supposed to police supervise the business and I'm pretty sure that telling them that a company is trying hard to die is pretty useless.

Re:double standard

[kheldan]

I used to work in the coin-op game industry, which shares many similarities to the gambling industry, but where it's most relevant here is that both industries exist to produce one thing and one thing only: profit. That's all they care about, and very often they don't care how they do it, so long as they can divest people of their cash, and the less they have to spend doing that, so much the better. I for one am not in the least bit shocked to hear your story; I'm just nodding my head, and reminding myself that no matter how much I hate where I'm working now, I can be thankful that 20 years ago I got the hell away from the coin-op game industry and bullshit like you're talking about having put up with.

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

But that's precisely the point. But if the code is not good enough, they end up spending more money than if things were done right from the get go.

Re:double standard

[MadTwit]

Where did he steal anything, all he did was to play a game with much improved odds of him winning. The casinos made these machines freely available to be used and what he did was adopt a scheme of play which rewards him for his investment of hundreds to thousands of dollars, with even more money. If someone offers to play a broken game where you are guaranteed by playing in such a way, to make a profit, is playing in such a way stealing from the person runing the game? No.

Re:double standard

[justthinkit]

While everyone nags at "joaommp" for not reporting one slot company, applying what he says to this story produces the following new storyline:

Slot building company(s) design convoluted crap that only they understand the shouldn't-be-there flaws in, allowing for future exploits by "others" in the future.

Re:double standard

[Travelsonic]

.... what? Purposeful mis-characterization of arguments much?

Re:double standard

[PopeRatzo]

Anyone using them outside of this intended purpose is going to deeply offend the mafia bosses who run the casinos, which have the cops in their pockets.

The "Mafia" hasn't been in the casino business for decades. Today, the casinos are owned by the same people who own all big corporations: other corporations and the very tiny fragment of society that happens to be very rich. Oh, you can own stock, but that has nothing to do with "owning" a corporation.

The part about "having the cops in their pockets" hasn't changed, though, but now the "cops" means the courts who exist to protect...rich people.

Whether this guy actually "stole" from the slot machine or not doesn't matter. You are not allowed to win at a casino. If you are the luckiest person alive and the cards come up your way over the course of more than a few hours, you will be escorted off the premises, unless you place your winnings into a casino account (which guarantees the casino will get the money back). Casino owners will tell you that they are not in the business of letting people win at their tables or slots. They are in the "entertainment" business, just like the guy who sells white heroin in 30 dollar packets or 10 dollar rock cocaine on the West Side of Chicago. And in this case, "entertainment" means "losing your money".

I happen to enjoy gambling. I'll bet on sporting events, play cards, darts, Go, chess or backgammon. I'll bet on horseraces. I won't go into a casino, though. The neighborhood bookie is much more honorable and less hypocritical. Plus, we're related. That doesn't mean he wouldn't send a guy to collect money from me if I didn't have money I lost. But if I won every year the way I did in 2008, he'd happily let me continue to pay instead of banning me on the assumption that I'm cheating. He makes his money on the action, not from losers.

The ugliest part of the "gaming" industry in the US is the way local governments have embraced it in order to cover budget shortfalls caused by taxation systems that allow corporations and wealthy people to avoid paying their fair share. Casino gambling, like the lottery is just another regressive tax in a country that has been embracing regressive taxation more and more in the past three decades (at least).

I don't mind European casinos and after Castro's gone and they re-open the Havana casinos I might visit (and to wager on jai alai) but only because the culture is so different there. Not nearly as ugly as the US gaming/government/industrial complex.

Re:double standard

[Joe Snipe]

Bit more glaring that utilizing software glitches to game the stock market still appears to be unprosecutable.

Re:double standard

[Pharmboy]

If you actually RTFA, in all fairness, what they are accusing the man of IS cracking with the help of social engineering. This isn't some "tap the side of the box three times and put in two coins" trick, it requires getting an employee to open the machine, set an option that is usually NOT set, then using a precise set of button pushes, it creates a FALSE jackpot, which might have been put there for testing or display only, as the machine doesn't record it as a jackpot at all. The guy didn't even put a coin in the machine. It is a dishonest crack, with the intention of defrauding the casino. If he is doing what they say he is doing, then obviously he should be arrested and punished. It isn't "proof of concept" or white hat hacking, it is theft by fraud.

Lets not celebrate an (alleged) common criminal, even if he uses uncommon methods.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

He's done nothing wrong? Hmm, what is your street address? You DO realize that your security has a flaw, right? Lock bumping makes it trivially easy for me to break in to your house and take your stuff. Not to mention, I bet you have your windows made of glass. Obviously, you won't mind if I use your security errors to profit from you, right? You do? Isn't this the free market at work? If it's a problem, buy a better lock. If you don't buy a better lock, I'm justified in taking your stuff.

And if he made his living from the insecurity of other people's homes I'd say you had a valid analogy. Or if he made a game of chance out of the security of his home, rigged the game to be in his favor, and then made bets ($$$) about whether you'd win that game, you would have had a valid analogy. Since he doesn't, your analogy is shite. It's just more emotional crap that invokes the name of justice and pretends to be a good argument.

Don't get me wrong now. I am sure the casinos are grateful that people like you will use invalid argumentation to defend their good name without compensation. I bet they wish more people like you would do that for free, it would save them money on PR and marketing. They of course share your desire to live in a world where no corporation should ever have to bear responsibility for the consequences of its choice to use shoddy, low-quality products such as the slot-machine software in question.

Really, what's wrong with you? You remind me of what I have read about Soviet-style brainwashing.

Re:double standard

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

"Grasshopper always wrong in argument with chicken."

--Book of Chao

Re:double standard

[selven]

Even if you have an unlocked door, it's still illegal to break into a person's house. This is completely different - the man paid for the right to interact with the machines, and he interacted with the machines. He did not take a hammer and break the machine, he played the game according to the rules that the machine enforced. The fact that the casino screwed up and made the rules have a loophole in them changes nothing.

Re:double standard

[mug funky]

way to go, straw man.

1. a person's place of residence (necessarily by zoning laws etc) is not a commercial enterprise.
2. a casino actively invites people to come in and use their machines.
3. a slot machine is covered in statements to the effect that if you press the right buttons, money will come out of it.

to expand upon your analogy, this would be like putting up flashing neon billboards outside the house saying "come in! there's so much money in here just waiting for you to take it!", leaving the doors wide open, then pressing charges when someone walks in off the street and takes your PS3.

Re:double standard

[blair1q]

I once gave the Bally's box office $135 to see George Carlin do a show that, I was disappointed to realize, I'd seen him do on HBO six months before. I'm sure he got a fat slice of that.

He always was a funny guy, and nailed it when he's right, but he's not immune to the double standard, hypocrisy, or half-though-out premise.

Re:double standard

[chaboud]

He used the interface of the machine as intentionally designed, configured willingly by casino staff. No trick coins, no bump keys, no insertion of a backdoor (that's still up in the air) into the code.

These machines are intentionally set up to pay out anywhere from 85-93% of what they take in, just raking in cash by being there. Live by the sword, die by the sword.

Sorry, but it's just not the same thing as a locked door. The intent of a locked door is clear, to signal ownership and provide moderate (not really) protection. The intent of a slot machine is also clear, to engage in a pseudo-random game of chance, biased typically toward the owner of the machine. He engaged in that game and won. If you knew that a roulette table hit a particular number commonly enough to make the odds worth it, you'd play that table. It's up to the casinos and manufacturers to make sure that the games that they've rigged in their favor actually remain so.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

The smart ones stay home and send us the money.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Rigged game. Thus the only winning move is not to play.

Re:double standard

[arkenian]

So remind me again what we think of people who exploit bugs in WoW, or evercrack? Hell back in the MUD days about the only rule you could count on to be enforced in nearly any MUD you went to is "Please report any bugs you find, exploiting a bug will get you banned." or something similar. He paid to play a game not to "interact with the machine" and then cheated at it.

Don't get me wrong, the slot machine makers need to do better, but that doesn't change the fact that he was cheating and knew it.

Re:double standard

[Urza9814]

Are you a casino employee, or are you actually that fucking stupid?

What the casinos are doing is more like locking a bike to a bike rack and putting a note saying "If you can open the chain, the bike is yours." and then calling the cops when someone cuts the lock instead of guessing the combination.

Re:double standard

[OldHawk777]

This is the state of the corporate-welfare state. Incompetent C*Os moving to the next failing company for more retirement benefits. Investment backers/bankers hedge-funds paying politicians for special nepotist market privileges and bailouts for more failures.

Insurance, Medical, and Drug companies manage longterm health-care treatments for profits without cures for US, EU.... Energy/Oil thugs.... Means-testing to cut middle class benefits and increase corporate-welfare for the wealthy....

Just more fyckUS, fyckEU....

Re:double standard

[mikestew]

The truth doesn't hurt, but it is evidence of Carlin's rapidly progressing bitterness in his old age. George Carlin didn't see the point in one of my forms of entertainment? Yeah, I'm hurt, I really am.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

My security includes a shotgun, among other layers.

Re:double standard

[Genda]

In fact George is immune to everything you mentioned and virtually everything else now, save decomposition... the boy has passed from this mortal coil. By the way, if you actually do research about the man, you'll find that even though he was a thoroughly human, human being, and subject to his fair share of faults, George was one of the most intelligent, hard working, eclectic, and ethically scrupulous people walking the planet, and had no trouble publicly pointing out where he'd been at fault or error. I love what he said about "Political Jokes".

To paraphase; "I don't do Political Jokes. It's not like Politicians fall out of a rift in the universe from a parallel dimension. Where do you get greedy, corrupt, stupid Politicians? You get them from a greedy, corrupt, stupid Society which rewards greed, corruption, and stupidity. What's to joke about?"

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

I think you missed the point entirely.

Re:double standard

[spun]

That's the dumbest analogy I've ever read.

Re:double standard

[suomynonAyletamitlU]

All of the problems quoted have commercial solutions (barred windows, electronic locks, security systems, trained guard dogs, etc) for exactly that reason, should a person find themselves living in an area where they could reasonably expect people to try breaking in.

The free market at work has provided a solution to those problem for affected parties. The question of whether you become an affected party or not is some combination of logistics and statistics. Over time, a larger and larger percentage of those people who are at risk will adopt them, assuming they have the money.

Logically, if casinos are on the ragged edge of losing millions every day from insufficient security, they'll feel that same pressure. If on the other hand, anyone who dares is arrested by federal agents, that's not market pressure. If all cops worked as hard to solve burglary cases and reclaim stolen property, there wouldn't be much of a market for home security, either. And speaking to the GP's point, if you live in an area where you DON'T get that kind of support from the police, but casinos do on your tax dime, then yes, the federal government is actually, incredibly irresponsible. It would be different if this one person stealing millions was going to build a criminal empire or something, which might arguably be a federal issue (if it crossed state lines, otherwise a state issue).

Is the person who stole money from a casino somehow not a criminal? No, I agree with you on that, they are. However, protecting people who don't bother to properly secure their millions of dollars is bad policy, when it's at the state or federal level. Arguably, local economies may have more vested interests, but there's not all that much that local cops can do, either.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

I enjoy the shows and I enjoy poker where, besides for a small house commission, I play against other people instead of playing against the house.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, it depends on the error. If anyone can show that the flawed code results in less than the stated return (depending on the location / state casino machines have to return a certain amount of their gross as winnings), then the gaming commission would be interested. Supposedly the code is certified to actually meet the required return rates. After reading about this, I wonder if someone pulled the statistic from someplace where the sun doesn't shine?

Re:double standard

[ChaoticPup]

How are software errors legally taken advantage of by casinos?

The machines are tested by the manufacturors, then by a 3rd party testing lab such as GLI, then often undergo further testing before being publicly available... depending on jurisdiction. Yeah, stuff gets through sometimes. Regulators continue to monitor and/or spot check machines while they are in the field. If something gets discovered in the field, action is usually taken fairly quickly. Depending on the nature of what was discovered, a software update may be ordered or the machine may be recalled (sometimes immediately).

The jurisdictional regulator exists to protect the players, not the casinos. The majority of regulations are designed to ensure the players get a "fair shake." That said, of course the casinos are in the business to make a profit... but at least in a manner that is predictable and "fair".

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

I worked one month for a major gaming / lottery company myself before quitting in disgust. (And this was after three months of having been unemployed a couple of years before the latest depression when I was desperate.) My experiences were much like yours except for the chance to make a better team. No documentation (in the code or otherwise). No software control standards. Poor version control. Crappy code. And absolutely no morale at the workplace and a terrible martinet gnome of a boss who jerked me around on hiring me in the first place. To this day, I do not place that company on my resume.

Part of me really hopes it was the same company so that there aren't two of them. (Hell, I'm posting AC. I'll name names. It was Scientific Gaming.)

Re:double standard

[VocationalZero]

Mod parent up, hit the nail on the head.

Grandparent's analogy fails. A closer analogy would be that and you pay someone who owns millions of houses to guide you around and tell you which one to loot, and you find a way to influence the guide (without bribery). Who made this "guide"? The casinos did. Who is ultimately responsible for the guide's actions? The casinos should be, but the system has been corrupted.

Re:double standard

[turbidostato]

"I was hired as R&D manager and I was absolutely terrified when I saw how things were done."

What did you expect? They don't need to advance and they don't need to compete since they are protected by law. They don't need to be careful either, since any mistake is covered for them by law too. It would be idiotic to expend even one uneeded dollar to do things any way better!

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

No, definitely not the same company. It was basically as you described. I forgot to mention the documentation part, points for you for remembering that. They didn't even knew what a wiki was (to say the least) and comments in the code were non-existing. My direct boss was the actual owner of the company and even though I got to admit that if he got to be rich, it was not for being stupid, no one can be always right and people, at a certain age, start losing it. He canceled all open positions for jobs, all R&D projects and even the designers were doing little less than designing business cards.

Re:double standard

[hedwards]

Depending upon what you're willing to lose over this, this is exactly the sort of thing that Wikileaks is for. Unfortunately, it's a pretty good bet that you'd end up blacklisted from the industry for doing it, as I suspect that they've got much better measures in place to figure out who leaked the code.

Re:double standard

[steveb3210]

You don't sign/agree to an EULA when you sit down at a slot machine...

Re:double standard

[hedwards]

No, we're not surprised, but the house doesn't need to cheat in order to win. What they typically do when they want to juice profits is find ways of making the gambling process go faster.

The only exception that I can think of is blackjack, and that's a game that provided as a sort of community service. People want to play it, but it's pretty much the only game where the house isn't assured of winning over the longterm on any given player. Poker would also be in that category were it not for the fact that the house doesn't represent a particular player and instead profits via the rake.

Re:double standard

[icebraining]

Yeah, I like poker too (although I don't play for money), but to be fair most people playing in casinos aren't there for poker. Slot machines are extremely popular, and that's basically throwing money away.

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

Actually, things are quite not like that. Law says that companies are expected to be compliant to standards and pass the certification tests before putting the machines on the market. The story just goes against the basic law of the gambling industry which is that the player's winnings have to be protected above all else. That's why even for the hardware, there is specialized hardware that has to conform to certain rules, such as including on board IO for buttons and lights, NVRAM to hold the game data so, on a power fail, the game can be resumed to the point when the machine went off, TPM chips, IO unlocking chips and some other characteristics. The "they don't need to be careful" is quite not right because that will depend a lot on the country where the machines are being used. And they need to remember that if a machine fails, instead of the money that the player loses, may be the company's money to be lost.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Similar experience for me. I worked for the 800 pound gorilla in the slot industry for 4 months and quit; had to repay all the moving expenses. They had been working on the slot machine, modifying an existing codebase, for three years and it still didn't work right. My first task was to fix the affinity card reader code. The code to interface with the card reader was written in C and the game was written in Java. It used shared memory to pass card information back and forth. Reading the card happened in real time, asynchronously with the Java code; the C could could write into the data buffer and the Java code could read the data buffer at any time... that's right folks, there was no locking of the data buffer for reads / writes. The result was that if you inserted / removed the card too quickly, the Java code could (and did) become confused. If you played the game too quickly, you'd end up with credit imbalances. I've never worked with a bigger group of duds before in my life. One guy on the team was sleeping 90% of the time. When I resigned and was asked why, I told them "It's the biggest group of duds I've ever seen. It shouldn't take more than three years to develop a slot machine. In fact, one guy is sleeping 90% of the time", and the HR rep said, "Is that John?" (So, they knew he was sleeping all the time) The slot machine companies do NOT have top-tier developers. They do have good lawyers and lots of experience protecting their investments & keeping people from winning through means they deem fraudulent.

Re:double standard

[hedwards]

They weren't just lucky or observant, from the article they had to have knowledge of a software glitch and for the glitch to be internally activated. Which they arranged to be done by persuading technicians to activate the glitch.

This isn't a matter of somebody exploiting a bug they found and failing to turn over the proceeds. This is a case where they were causing the glitch to be activated on purpose.

Or at least that's the allegation and the basis for charges being filed. If true it's not something that's going to happen just because you got lucky, this was apparently a scam that was committed all over the world.

Re:double standard

[PhxBlue]

Flynn, is that you? :)

Re:double standard

[sconeu]

What gaming commission?

The Nevada Gaming Commission. Yeah, this company may be worldwide, but once they're banned from Vegas and Reno, they'll clean up their act really quickly.

Re:double standard

[hedwards]

Swissvale man accused in casino thefts arrested by federal agents

The pair, according to police, had knowledge of a software glitch in one of the high-bet slot machines. In order to expose the glitch, a special "double-up" feature had to be internally activated. The men persuaded casino technicians to alter "soft" options on the machines, such as volume and screen brightness controls. Such perks aren't unusual for high-rollers, who can wager anywhere from a few hundred to thousands of dollars in one day.

This is what makes it theft. Or more specifically it's being charged as wire fraud, if I'm understanding that correctly.

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

Above all, and already predicting a fuckload of jokes, leaking data, whatever the kind, is unprofessional and something I wouldn't do. What would be the point? What would I gain with that, besides seriously damaging my reputation when I got caught?

Re:double standard

[turbidostato]

"If you knew that a roulette table hit a particular number commonly enough to make the odds worth it, you'd play that table."

And then the casino would press federal charges against you so they can stay in bussiness without the inconvenience of having to use proper tools.

Which is exactly what this news is about.

Re:double standard

[bhcompy]

Kind of like counting cards for single deck blackjack. It's illegal to be too smart.

Re:double standard

[Moryath]

Not far off the mark, really.

There was a case of someone winning a jackpot a while back and the casino claiming the jackpot was a "software error" after the fact. Denver Post Article. As the article shows, such "errors" are relatively common.

And of course, the casinos always reserve the right to claim someone is "cheating" or simply "winning too much", or "card counting", and pull all sorts of nasty tricks.

Also remember: in a gambling town, the cops and judges aren't paid by the local government. They're paid by the casinos. Period.

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

I repeat, what gaming commission? First, the company hadn't had any machines in the US for a long time, all of the development was made outside the US, despite the fact that the headquarters was there, and the division I built was an ocean away from there. Now think: do you really think they would care? Besides, to be able to put the machines in service in the US, one of the several certification companies there has to first approve the machines.

Re:double standard

[h4rr4r]

If you like slot machines you should get into factory work. You can do the same menial task over and over and actually get paid to it!

Re:double standard

[Solandri]

The whole gambling industry (including lotteries) is nothing more than a system of wealth redistribution. The rich love casinos (if they own the place) because it makes money for them and the government loves casinos because it means more tax revenue. Everyone else loses.

It's only a loss if you ignore the entertainment value. My friends who go to Las Vegas do so mostly because it lets them get a weekend's entertainment fairly cheaply (if you're into the sorts of things Vegas offers).

If you ignoring the entertainment value and looking strictly at what material goods or enhanced capability you've acquired for your money spent, then amusement parks, movie theaters, cable TV, computer games, plays, vacation travel, hiking trips, beach trips, etc. are all "losses". You could claim that the people running all those industries have simply created a system of wealth redistribution.

Yes, it's extraordinarily bad for a subset of people who have a gambling problem. But the same is true for nearly any activity.

Re:double standard

[Sancho]

You missed:

2) For some reason, this particular company didn't have a single machine in the USA for several years.

Apparently they don't do business in Nevada, and they don't care.

Re:double standard

[blair1q]

Oops. I started to change my comment about him to the past tense but hit Submit before I'd completed the mission.

As for his take on political jokes, he forgot that it's the job of a famous comedian to hold the society and its government up to ridicule, to make plain the truths about its hypocrisies (much of humor comes from unlocking a truth many subconsciously suspect everyone knows; laughing is a means of communicating your concurrence to the rest of the audience).

Just so you don't mistake me, I've always loved the guy, from his doobed-out hippie-dippie weatherman days to his post-substance-abuse ultra-curmudgeon-rant days to his rising from the dead days. But I disagree with him on a few things, particularly golf courses, the value proposition that is Vegas, and now political jokes. Doesn't mean I don't love him any more just because he's dead and sometimes wrong.

Re:double standard

[h4rr4r]

In what way did he steal?

He used the exposed interfaces in a way clearly not abusive to the machine. He did not go tampering with it he just used it.

Re:double standard

[h4rr4r]

This is not different because it is on a computer. If you track which roulette tables hit certain numbers or find a way to play blackjack that improves your odds where is the problem?

Re:double standard

[h4rr4r]

Getting him banned form the casinos is fine, I doubt anyone would require the casinos to let him play there. Cheating in Wow is not a crime either.

Re:double standard

[h4rr4r]

So they asked for a feature to be turned on and the casinos did it?

Where is the problem?
They found a way to gamble better, that is not a scam that is gambling. No different then finding a roulette wheel that likes certain numbers.

Re:double standard

[jedidiah]

Viewing it as entertainment is one thing.

However, Casino towns do not thrive on that sort of attitude. They thrive on milking the suckers for everything they're worth.

The casino billboards for 2nd mortgage loans near McCarran should give some indication of how sleazy and crass they really are.

The Corps are like the Mob with with no pride and less restraint.

Re:double standard

[Dthief]

correct me if wrong: counting cards in Blackjack is legal.....but so is denying you entrance/play at a casino and blackballing you at every other casino

Re:double standard

[Jane Q. Public]

This is a straw-man argument. It isn't against the law to distract somebody from the fact that they're losing their shorts... as long as they're losing their shorts legally. The only real question here is whether exploiting this error was illegal or not.

Let me give you a real-world example: teams of people in the past have used statistical methods to determine that certain roulette wheels had minute flaws that caused them to pay out slightly more on some bets than others. Then they alternated the players to distract from the fact that they were making good winnings. They were exploiting a flaw in the system... but they were doing so legally. So when some of them got noticed, they could not be prosecuted for "conspiracy", because they weren't doing anything illegal.

In the same way, the only question here is whether exploiting this flaw in the system is illegal. If not, then there was no "con" or "conspiracy". And I argue that there is no basis for calling it illegal. A flaw is a flaw, and it's the responsibility of the makers.

Re:double standard

[jedidiah]

Skill cranes are like this too. They have a pressure adjustment for the claw that allows it to be set so that you can never "win".

Re:double standard

[shadowfaxcrx]

Damn right. Or at least, if it IS illegal to distract someone from the fact that they're losing their shorts, I expect a lot of casino orders to either get rid of the flashy lights and the whirring and beeping sounds and the complimentary cocktails and the dancing girls, or do jailtime. There's a reason every casino has all that crap in it - to keep you from realizing that all you're doing is pouring money into a vending machine that doesn't actually vend anything.

Re:double standard

[Jane Q. Public]

Jesus, don't you know anything about the history of Las Vegas? The Corps ARE the Mob.

Re:double standard

[shentino]

They're probably in bed with the casinos.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

I've heard more and more places HAVE removed the complimentary cocktails. Phooey I say.

Re:double standard

[eqisow]

Banned, not prosecuted... and since in game currency has real world value, isn't gold duping effectively the same as this case, albeit in smaller amounts?

Re:double standard

[Belial6]

I can honestly say that I have never lost a dime in a casino. I have spent a little money for entertainment, just as some do in a movie theater, but I have never lost money in a casino.

Re:double standard

[badboy_tw2002]

With the exception of card counting, how do you figure that? The house always has an edge, which means that over a long term they're guaranteed to win. Its a smaller edge than some games, sure, but its still and edge. And if you're saying blackjack is a public service, what about craps? Its got better odds in most places.

Re:double standard

[NoExQQ]

Again this raises a great question (I love asking this when in a small social group). If you knew you would have to go to jail in a US federal prison for 2-3 years, how much money would you have to get to make it worth your time? You'd be surprised how many people respond $5 million.

Re:double standard

[yeshuawatso]

Don't forget: shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cock sucker, mother fucker, tits.

Re:double standard

[tsm_sf]

Going by your UID I'm going to have to call you a horrible, horrible liar.

Re:double standard

[shadowfaxcrx]

Sure, if you're on the nickel slots.

The high rollers still get all sorts of free crap.

Re:double standard

[servognome]

He engaged in that game and won.

No, he engaged in a series of activities that he knew would bypass the psuedo-random game and falsely display winning jackpots. Imagine if the casino exploited a bug that displayed "you lose" when the randomizer actually produced a winning combination.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

The house always wins

This cannot be emphasized enough. If you discover a way to consistently win money at a casino, the best you can hope for is to be invited to never come back. Depending on how much money you win, and how much the LEOs are in the pocket of the casino, you may or may not have two functioning kneecaps coming out of that invitation.

Re:double standard

[Phoobarnvaz]

Are we really surprised? There are very few games in a casino where the house doesn't have a significant advantage. The house wants you to lose money because their business model depends on it. They only pay out winnings to keep people coming back. The whole gambling industry (including lotteries) is nothing more than a system of wealth redistribution. The rich love casinos (if they own the place) because it makes money for them and the government loves casinos because it means more tax revenue. Everyone else loses.

I used to work in casinos for several years...but never in actually running the game itself. Got out of it after about 3-4 years of not being able to handle working for a large company (Goldman Sucks)...egotistic managers...idiotic co-workers (did have some good people I would be more than happy to work with at any other job) and being able to not look in the mirror because of my employment in a business set up to screw people out of their money...even of their own accord.

One thing you have to realize about any lawful casino (usually an international company of another division of a company who may have stole your retirement on Wall Street)...the odds are set by the state. Those lights...drinks you love...machines you play are there to make sure you lose and lose as much as they can wring from you. As they used to tell us over and over...you have a job because people lose. You want to win at a casino...don't walk in the door or don't stop at any table or machine.

If you believe a casino won't make money...on some of the worst days during the week...I would go through at least 1/2 a million dollars we would unload from 1/6 of all the machines every week. On many weekends...it wasn't uncommon to have between 1-2 million dollars go through my hands on Saturday and Sunday.

The one thing to tell your grandmother...never play a penny slot machine. These thieves are set on the floor to take your money as quickly as you can shovel it into the coin slot. I have better odds pissing and hitting a jet at 35,000 feet than winning a decent payout on one of these machines. The reason...they are intentionally set up to waste your time and distract you. The reason...you may bet 100+ pennies ($1.00+) at one time...but you tell yourself it's only pennies. Use this analogy to a quarter/dollar machine. You bet 100 quarters ($25 +) or dollars ($100+) at one time...but having the better amounts on these machines...your odds are better to at least get some of your money back than the penny machines.

You want walk away with better odds of winning part of whatever you put into the machine...play the quarter+ machines or goto the high roller area. The service is better and you will walk away with something more than the grandma throwing her inheritance on those penny machines. Plus...at the higher denomination machines...you don't suck in smoke from someone who thinks it's okay to poison the air around them.

The one overall rule about any casino is there is no such thing as luck...only odds/probabilities. They are set against you no matter what you think.

Re:double standard

[Skynyrd]

IIRC, it's using some sort of devise to help count that's illegal.

Other than your brain, of course.

Re:double standard

[Dash275]

You'll just become a "marked man" of sorts. In Las Vegas you'll be entered into the black book, and pit bosses and the like will ask you to leave the casino if they find you.

Re:double standard

[cob666]

Tits shouldn't even be on the list, it sounds like a snack.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Sparing anyone else from accepting the same position you did and going through the same agony? Not that _you_ would gain anything, other than the pleasant feelings associated with helping your fellow man, but that would be the point.

Not that I'm pushing you to do it -- if you consider it unprofessional, and aspire to be professional, that's quite good enough for me, but you asked what would be the point...

Re:double standard

[cob666]

You don't even have to count cards in blackjack, if you play basic strategy you can bring the house odds down to under 1% compared to the double zero Roulette house advantage of just over 5.25%.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Tits shouldn't even be on the list, it sounds like a snack.

Well, at least to infants.

Re:double standard

[cudaboy_71]

a more accurate analogy might not involve locks at all. you opened the door for them, and invited them (for a small fee) to try to 'steal' as much stuff as they could from within your 'secured area'. when your secured area is not as secure as you thought, your guest is now a criminal.

Re:double standard

[Jessified]

"Even if you have an unlocked door, it's still illegal to break into a person's house."

I don't know about the states, but in Canada the above statement is incorrect. It's only a break and enter if you bypass a lock or if you remove something from the house. Entering an unlocked door, in and of itself, is not a crime. This makes sense, for example, if you are seeing if something is wrong after a friend doesn't answer their door etc. If that's a problem, then lock the door.

Not relevant to this article maybe. Meh.

Re:double standard

[sconeu]

Yeah, I did miss that.

In the immortal words of Emily Latella... "Oh, that's very different. Never mind"

Re:double standard

[badboy_tw2002]

Its still an edge (See here.). In the long long run you won't win. GGP states the opposite: "it's pretty much the only game where the house isn't assured of winning over the longterm on any given player"

Re:double standard

[Golddess]

I imagine that's only because it's kinda hard to prove you were counting cards unless they find some sort of physical device.

Re:double standard

[KingAlanI]

icebraining *did* say "George Carlin later apologized" :)
I agree that Carlin was often a master at bluntly and humorously telling the truth.

"Sometimes, the jester is the only one who can safely tell the truth"

Stewart and Colbert seem to be another obvious example of what you refer to.

Re:double standard

[RobDollar]

You don't sign/agree to an EULA when you sit down at a slot machine...

That's an interesting point, what are the legalities when it comes to using these machines? I understand that even now you can be kicked out of a casino for counting cards on traditional black jack, but theres no law against it.

Does anyone know how far someone can take a slot machine exploit before it becomes illegal?

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, no. They couldn't press federal charges (see wikipedia), and if they tried a civil suit, they'd almost certainly lose. Because placing certain bets on a mechanical wheel is just placing bets, but pressing buttons that are supposed to place bets in a computerized slot machine is Computer Hacking, and we have Laws about that.

What would generally happen is that you would be barred from playing at that casino (and most others) ever again.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

well if there's no security problems that you found (at least you haven't stated you have), there's nothing to report. the gaming commissions don't care if the company making the software/devices suck as long as they do what they're intended to do and clear security. that being said, you made me feel a little (more than a little really) less proud to have my software pass through the nevada gaming commission on the first try.

Re:double standard

[mikestew]

No, you're absolutely right. They don't build strip hotels on the few grand we might drop in a bad week in Vegas.

I know the odds, I know the house advantage on every game we play (and avoid the ones I haven't figured out). I also assume we're the exception. That has always put me at odds with participating in an industry that is, and traditionally has been, sleazy.

But we do have fun, ethical dilemmas be damned!

Re:double standard

[joaommp]

That wouldn't spare anyone from any agony. If someone didn't find the agony there, there are many other places where there would be agony for him. And doing that to the company doesn't mean that the company would be shut down or anything else.
And don't get me wrong, because, to be honest, I did love that position, I loved the work I did, had a real sense of fulfillment and amazingly nice feedback from everyone. But when I understood I could not trust the people above me and that the company was headed for self-destruction, that was when I quit. And trust is my reason. That's one thing I'm not willing to break, therefore I wouldn't do anything of the kind.

Re:double standard

[exomondo]

ooohh...card counting, yeah sorry you've gotten so good at this game that you can consistently beat us and we don't like that so we're gonna cry to the government and make it illegal for us to lose like that. But it's cool, lots of the money we win from you goes to the government so they'll support us even though they are supposed to be serving you.

Re:double standard

[Mr. Slippery]

I once gave the Bally's box office $135 to see George Carlin do a show that, I was disappointed to realize, I'd seen him do on HBO six months before. I'm sure he got a fat slice of that.

Yeah. And I paid all this money to see this band one time, and I was disappointed to realize I'd heard them do the same songs on their last CD.

Seriously: WTF were you expecting?

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

I imagine that's only because it's kinda hard to prove you were counting cards unless they find some sort of physical device.

You would vary your bets increasing when the cards favoured you and going back to smaller bets when they favoured the house. That would be proof enough that you were card counting.

Re:double standard

[Ghengis Khak]

Casino gambling, like the lottery is just another regressive tax in a country that has been embracing regressive taxation more and more in the past three decades (at least).

Taxes are compulsory; the exchange of money in a casino is not.

Re:double standard

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

So, are you saying that doing a show is unethical because you just might have seen footage of that show before?

Also, EVERY SINGLE SHOW Carlin ever did HAD A FREAKING CLEAR NAME. It's understandable to get pissed of at a comedian that pretends to have a new show, but instead just reuses material. Carlin NEVER DID THAT. Each show was written entirely by him, each had a clear name, and was packed tight of nothing but new material. He only reused little pieces of material that were very popular, like "Modern Man" and the "Publicity" sketch, or "There is no god".

So, if you are too fucking stupid to check the name of the show you are going to see, and realize you have seen it already ... well, that's not the comedian's fault, you know?.

Re:double standard

[BLKMGK]

I would agree were it not for the fact that he apparently had to jump through hoops to get them to tweak the machine "just right" to get his payouts. This wasn't left right left right up down Jackpot! It was him having to get the machines twiddled just right to make them vulnerable. One cannot help but wonder how he knew that these exact settings needed to be set in order to get the payout. If this were just some specific betting pattern or something discovered by trial and error - which I seriously doubt - then I'd be much more upset.

Re:double standard

[BLKMGK]

Yeah, in a case like that I can see getting pretty ticked off that there wasn't a payout. If the machine says Jackpot! then coming along and saying "oops" is bullshit unless the machine was tinkered with. If you figure out a way to get the machine to payout that doesn't require twiddling it's guts then bully for you - you win. but this guy? This guy and his friends I'm not so sympathetic with.

Re:double standard

[lessthan]

At what point were they "robbing?" When did they cut into the inner workings of the machine to change the outcome? Is it the same as counting cards is "cheating?" Never mind that you have to have a phenomenal memory and a good grasp of probability for card counting to work. What about flying? Large hunks of aluminum don't normally fly through the air, so jet engines must be cheating physics. Right? These guys found a way to win that was completely within the rules of the game. The casinos already have the means to dealing with the cheat, you know, by fixing the machines. Why are they trying to get the money that they lost by the rules of their own game ?

Re:double standard

[DavidTC]

Going to Vegas is a great vacation. Everything there is rigged to be fun and distracting, you'll never be bored, there are great shows.

As long as you don't gamble. If you don't gamble, half the stuff you do is be subsided by idiots who are gambling.

That $50 dollar hotel rooms? Cheaper than roadside motels in the middle of nowhere? They're expecting you to spend $50 bucks a day in the casino.

That $50 show you want to see? Really costs $80 dollars, but on average people spend $30 dollars waiting for the show to start in the casino.

Hell, that's why so many conferences are there...the space is cheap, because they expect to make a huge amount of money fleecing the idiotic convention-goers.

Seriously, Vegas is a great place to go and vacation on the backs of gamblers.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Why? Isn't this the free market at work? If it's a problem, then fix the machines.

God damnit... I'm so tired of people citing "free market" as if it were synonymous with total anarchy. In this case it doesn't mean, "if you can break the law to win, do it". It means if you don't like the rules of a casino, DON'T GO THERE.

Big difference. Free market doesn't mean "everyone gets away with anything without rule of law".

Re:double standard

[mustPushCart]

Its the law that even if its a software error, or you are card counting, or you are sleeping with lady luck; they have a right to throw you out but they can NOT take the money you already won unless they can prove you were cheating. If they simply do not like you they can ask you to leave but they cant take what they cant prove you have stolen.

Re:double standard

[Thing 1]

Came here to say this; glad it has been said.

Re:double standard

[kramerd]

No, its more like the casino locks a bike to a bike rack, sells keys out of a bucket of keys, one of which opens the lock, collects the keys after each person fails, says 'if you can open the chain, the bike is yours,' a man came up and asked if he could pay for a key and try his house key, the casino agreed, the key worked, and the casino called the police.

I have to agree with the other responses though, it is a stupid analogy.

Re:double standard

[Dun Malg]

They don't have to cry to the government to stop you winning by counting cards. They are allowed to simply bar you from gambling at their tables. There's no law that says they are REQUIRED to let everyone gamble. Truly effective card counters are so few that all the pit bosses know them on sight and instruct the dealers to not deal to them. That's why card counters write books on card counting, because they can't make money at cards anymore.

Re:double standard

[PopeRatzo]

Taxes are compulsory; the exchange of money in a casino is not.

Just like using credit cards or home equity loans is not compulsory, unless your family is hungry and you have no other options.

The US economy is increasing based on taking options away from people, not giving them choices. All the "choices" we think we have are really just superficial and illusory. Economic mobility is decreasing, and the companies that are getting rich and the tiny fraction of society that owns them like it that way.

Re:double standard

[Dun Malg]

The gaming commission has nothing to say on the matter of slot machine programmers using version control or any other facets of good programming practice. Gaming commission only cares that machines pay out honestly. If they can somehow make an honest machine by dumping /dev/random to a microcontroller, that's within their right.

Re:double standard

[Dun Malg]

It's not illegal to count cards. Casinos, however, are under no obligation to allow a card counter to play.

Re:double standard

[servognome]

What if the shoe is on the other foot and the casino exploited a bug so that a person would lose more often if the settings were set up a certain way? I'm sure there'd be an outcry because they might be playing with the software approved by the gaming commission, but not according to the rules

Re:double standard

[trum4n]

But they do. Remember, money is law. And they have the money!

Re:double standard

[wvmarle]

Mmm... lemme guess... not easy... the one working anonymously and alone, or the one working for a well known "too big to fail" company... no idea... please gimme a coin, it's a toss-up. Heads says it's the lone hacker, tails says it's not the big company.

Re:double standard

[st0nes]

At the end of the day they are more concerned in who is paying their fee's and not how it effects the public. -- Attention... all grammer nazi"s! Is they're anything; wrong with: my post,

Yes, it's fees, not fee's.

Re:double standard

[wvmarle]

If this person has broken the law, he's done something wrong. Sorry about that. Even if he didn't know about the law: ignorance of the law is no defense. You can not say "sorry judge, I may have broken the law, but I didn't do anything wrong so you have to let me go".

What you're probably trying to say is that you do not agree with the law.

I agree that if indeed he was playing the machine the way it was designed to be played with (put in coins/card, press buttons), and then started playing in a way that gave him the best odds, then he should be in the clear. If that's not allowed the law is simply wrong.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not going to Vegas for the long run. I'm going for the weekend.

Re:double standard

[SecurityGuy]

There was a case of someone winning a jackpot a while back and the casino claiming the jackpot was a "software error" after the fact.

Like everyone else, I read about such things with outrage until I actually RTFA. The jackpot she hit was about 100x higher than the maximum the machine was ever supposed to give, so it WAS an error, and obviously so.

Re:double standard

[Xeno man]

Nope. Playing the game as best as you can is part of the game. Using another device changes the game.

Re:double standard

[mrchaotica]

Hmm, what is your street address? You DO realize that your security has a flaw, right? Lock bumping makes it trivially easy for me to break in to your house and take your stuff.

If houses were gambling machines, you'd have a point. But they aren't, so you don't!

Re:double standard

[the_Bionic_lemming]

I dealt roulette for three years. I could nail within 3 to 5 in the section I was aiming for (meaning i'd look for a section of numbers on the table to drop the ball in to run off strokes that bought in for 100 and spread it everywhere so that I had to clean it up, pay out a few hits, then clean it up, lather, rinse, repeat).

Want to win at the wheel? Tip the dealer. Especially if they have experience.

Re:double standard

[Xeno man]

They thrive on milking the suckers for everything they're worth.

Casinos? It's not just casinos, that is every major cooperation in America. Everyone wants as much of your money as they can get for as little effort possible. Every advertisement, next generation, latest product, up sized combo meal, two for one, discount coupon, payment plan, three easy payment, subscription service, limited time offer all have the ultimate goal of getting as much money from you as possible. So why so much hate for the casinos?

I don't see them as much different from Apple that wants to make a new version of a their phone just so you can all buy it again, and hell, I bet half the people here can't wait to throw their money at Apple.

Re:double standard

[wvmarle]

While the man may have done something illegal, that doesn't clear the manufacturer/owner of the device.

I don't see why they would have such a "fake jackpot" option installed in a casino floor machine. Such code simply doesn't belong there. Test/demo routines definitely have their use, but they should be kept separate from production routines - e.g. in the form of an add-on software module that can be installed only on demo machines.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

In short, people who start or still gamble deserve to be scammed and taken advantage of by made up (or not) excuses. Specially since there is no appropriate law to punish and oversight casinos properly and strickly.

But why am i fooling myself with hopes, not even banks have such attention, why should people expect any better from casinos?

Re:double standard

[DDLKermit007]

And shills the casino's pay to gamble. The shill gets to keep a large percentage on the bankroll of the casino. It's a pretty sick getup how they do it. You're ALWAYS playing against the house.

Re:double standard

[ShakaUVM]

ast year I joined (and left) a major manufacturer of slot machines. I was hired as R&D manager and I was absolutely terrified when I saw how things were done. No good software development practices, their concept of version management was dumping source on a network share, the previous manager was the only one using a VCS and was for his private use, and the code was absolutely disappointing to say the least. The bad practices were so deeply marked on them that things were taken to a new facility, with an entire new team that I personally interviewed and trained them from the start, people that still didn't have any of the bad habits the old team had. Eventually I left because whoever was above me was far worse and I soon realized the company was off to die, because top level management were the ones that messed up in the first place and were about to destroy the company by killing all R&D and training and having the new team do sustained engineering on the bad code produced by the old team. This is the state of the gambling industry.

I was once hired to write a VR casino game. Pretty cool actually, shame it was never commercially released.

Anyway, the point is that they wanted it guaranteed rigged so even things which appeared to have a certain percentage chance of happening (say 25%) would be indeed 25% until the last piece would cause a win, in which case it wouldn't win except on an exceedingly diminutive chance.

I found a bug in it that would essentially let you 'spin the slots' as fast as the frame rate of the world, and seriously debated not fixing it in case the game ever was released. Damn morals - I fixed it. =)

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Kitkoan, you are full of... nvm. Could you site sources?

Re:double standard

[pspahn]

Also, affects, not effects.

Re:double standard

[pspahn]

So, your previous employer doesn't sell slot machines to Las Vegas, a city that defines the gambling industry, yet their poor practices define the "state of the gambling industry"?

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as you don't gamble. If you don't gamble, half the stuff you do is be subsided by idiots who are gambling.

Ever heard of facial recognition software? The casinos all have it and are tracking your spending. They want to know because if you are spending a lot they want to keep you and if you are winning a lot they want to make sure that they can change that. If you are just leeching they will know about it and if you keep doing it, you might just find it harder to book that cheap room next time.. and that show might be all booked up..

(Pure supposition on my part by the way, but if its not here already then that day will come soon enough)

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

I used to work in the coin-op game industry, which shares many similarities to the gambling industry, but where it's most relevant here is that both industries exist to produce one thing and one thing only: profit. That's all they care about, and very often they don't care how they do it, so long as they can divest people of their cash, and the less they have to spend doing that, so much the better.

And this differs from most industries exactly how?

Some industries might claim otherwise, how they exist to improve the standard of living or provide excellent service, when in fact they simply have not realized that a good track record in producing whatever it is they're producing is just a means of attaining the ever growing profits...

Re:double standard

[cgenman]

To be fair, the gentleman in question was asking technicians to enable an option that allowed him to get the software-glitch jackpot. This wasn't just a case of a Casino not wanting to make a big payout, but active, well-planned attempts to exploit a software flaw.

Re:double standard

[Genda]

That was the point... he did nothing but make fun of the society, and he didn't see any clear dividing line between it and the Politicians it produced. Our government is almost joke proof... it is it's own best parody.

Re:double standard

[CookieForYou]

uhm, it is not a pseudo-random in a true sense. The number generator is DESIGNED to output only a fraction of the input.

It's also true that some machines are set to higher numbers than others in order to attract attention.

They intentionally change the odds on you on the fly when they need to collect more money. Of course, this is regulated by a minimum percentage by most gaming boards, but there is no upper limit. It might be in a casino's favor to put a machine that pays out over 100% sometimes near a high traffic area to attract attention. Of course, they can change the odds at will, and probably often do.

But when the odds go against them, rather than being strictly under their control, it's a federal offense.

Re:double standard

[DZign]

Only in this situation it's more like the guy who calibrates the roulette wheels puts deliberately a specific flaw into them so you already know what numbers will pay out more.

Re:double standard

[emptycorp]

follow the money, lost winnings is lost taxes on gambling earnings by the casinos.

Re:double standard

[Jaxoreth]

Tits shouldn't even be on the list, it sounds like a snack.

Betcha can't eat just one...

Re:double standard

[ewanm89]

Correction, the local government is paid by the casinos.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

At the end of the day they are more concerned in who is paying their fee's and not how it effects the public.

Excuse me while I gouge my own eyeballs out.

Re:double standard

[L4t3r4lu5]

Regarding your sig; Yes. You're capitalising the start of sentences consistently.

Re:double standard

[AGMW]

The high rollers still get all sorts of free crap.

LOL! My guess is that the high rollers are actually paying for all the free crap. Do you honestly think the casinos are going to be encouraging the big players to come to their casinos if they're winning? Sheeez!

Actually, while I have your attention, I've got this old bridge in London I'm trying to sell ...

Re:double standard

[AGMW]

At what point were they "robbing?"

As I see it the problem here is that they knew the wins were bogus (and indeed, they knew because they engineered it!). If some hapless fool had chanced upon such a win (and therefore didn't know it to be bogus) they could legitimately have claimed the cash.
Also, I think that if the machine actually paid out the money directly, they'd have an argument to say the machine was faulty, but taking the print out to the cash desk definitely is one step too far over the line.

Re:double standard

[Anachragnome]

"The jackpot she hit was about 100x higher than the maximum the machine was ever supposed to give, so it WAS an error, and obviously so."

Not only that, but the amount supposedly won was identical in two of the linked articles--42.9 million dollars--by different people, in different cities, on different machines. Sounds like a reproducible error. How much you wanna bet they were "won" on the same MODEL of slot machine?

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Kind of like counting cards for single deck blackjack. It's illegal to be too smart.

It's not illegal to count cards in the US. But the Casino doesn't have to let you play if they think you are... they can ask you to leave for no particular reason at all if they wish.
As long as you're not using some kind of device to assist you, that is. Using any equipment at all is indeed illegal.

Re:double standard

[Builder]

Out of curiosity, can you point me to a single hedge fund that received any bail-out money please.

Re:double standard

[Pharmboy]

don't see why they would have such a "fake jackpot" option installed in a casino floor machine.

Many digital machines (not spinning reels) have a display mode that "simulates" a jackpot, because it catches your eye. It is basically a show put on by the machine, but it swaps into several display modes when no one is playing. This appears to be a stuck jackpot mode that is reset when the machine is opened or cleared, ie: a bug or stupid code left in.

Re:double standard

[ewanm89]

no, but it is a breach of contract in most cases as the EULA is technically a contractural obligation. Actual enforcability of such contracts and certain terms in them however is currently a minefield.

Re:double standard

[rainmouse]

To be fair Casinos are very likely to be rather good at probability and their staff are likely trained at spotting people who are just far too improbable. I don't think its unreasonable that when someone's winnings reaches billion to one odds, that another alternative to luck can be considered. Yes I know I'm taking the naive approach but too many people are jumping on the injustice bandwagon over a sensationalist article that has been misleadingly summed up and sensationalised some more. The top payout on the machine is 251,000 and she won 41,900,000.

Imagine you bid $20 on a pair of jeans on some auction site but a cat on keyboard malfunction caused you to bid 20 million instead. Now the seller is suing you for the 20 million you promised.
Hardly seems fair to be able to force you to somehow try and pay this off over the rest of your life now does it?

Re:double standard

[KDR_11k]

Sure. As long as they don't deny the player the winnings he already got.

Re:double standard

[Noughmad]

http://xkcd.com/326/

Re:double standard

[queBurro]

Card counting's not illegal though is it? I read (citation needed - sorry) that if you make one mistake in a hundred counting then you're not a threat anyway as that's about all the edge you get

Re:double standard

[AmiMoJo]

TFA says that this is apparently not uncommon for people who shovel a lot of money into slots. Changing things like the screen brightness or volume is common. In this case there was a bonus doubling feature that is usually turned off because gamblers don't like it. They don't want double-or-nothing risks, they like to play the shorter odds. It is simply an optional feature that happened to be exploitable. I don't see any difference between that and finding an exploit in one of the default features.

Bottom line is that the code was buggy and he found a way to turn it to his advantage. There is no suggestion that the technician did anything wrong by enabling this feature or that it is a particularly unusual thing to do.

Re:double standard

[Zebedeu]

What if you enjoy playing? What if you only play until you've lost an acceptable amount of money for your entertainment?

Do you also call people who go to the movies idiots? What about snowboarding?
Why are some forms of entertainment acceptable to you and others not?

The only stupid people in the casinos are those who play to win.
Yes, there are many of those, but there are also many who know their chance of winning is low, but they like to play anyway.

Re:double standard

[Geminii]

However, it was within the range that the machine was actually configured to give. Unless the casino posted a message on the machine saying "Maximum Jackpot $X", and gave that amount to anyone getting a greater amount out of the machine, I can't really see that they have much of a leg to stand on.

Really, if the casino had guarantees from the machine configuration/repair company that no more than $X would be paid, the casino would probably have grounds for recovering the excess jackpot from that company. However, a consumer winning that amount should still be entitled to receive it if there is no signage indicating otherwise.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

If Al Qaeda was serious about hating the decadency of the western world they'd bomb casinos, not office buildings.

Re:double standard

[trout007]

I used to try to card count in Atlantic City but I gave up because they used 8 deck shoes and shuffled half way through. The method I used a running total when you gave face cards and aces +1 and 2 through 6 -1. Then when the count became very positive you upped your bet. The problem is it only shifts the advantage a little bit. You need a big ass backroll to keep playing minimum bets through the times the deck isn't in your favor. If you have a team it's a bit easier since you can have someone standing behind the players watching and when the deck gets hot you can signal to someone else (big roller) to jump in. But the pit bosses are on the look out for this. With an 8 deck shoe the deck never got very hot and by the time it did they would reshuffle.

Re:double standard

[Kashgarinn]

It's a gamble.. i.e. a game, and the game mechanic is, you invest a small sum of your money to gain a chance at a large sum, she got that large sum, and in this case she got the cash because of a random effect from a software error.

It's their equipment, their responsibility that this doesn't happen _before_ it happens, it did, they should have payed her.

Re:double standard

[Gravitron 5000]

Wouldn't elections be more interesting if Diebold voting machines were more like electronic slot machines. Damn it! I just got 3 Palins!

Re:double standard

[icebraining]

So why so much hate for the casinos?

Well, for Carlin, it was because he was performing at the MGM Casino and the jokes were flying over the audience's heads.

Re:double standard

[Relayman]

I can be a grammer nazi. You rang? "fee's" should be "fees"; it's a plural, not a possessive. My apologies if it was just a keying error as I do that all the time (my fingers have a mind of their own).

Re:double standard

[Plekto]

Craps is the other game where you have a better than even chance to win.

How? Wait for newbies to make sucker bets out of ignorance and bet against them. It's unique in that the game is dictated by one player's actions and if you're smart, you can rake in a lot of money before they figure out what went wrong with their "system". It would be like having a "player loses" option in blackjack - just wait for the newbie idiot to hit on 17. In Craps, there IS such an option. And like in Poker there are a LOT of idiot players to take advantage of.

The pros in Vegas only play Blackjack, Craps, and Poker. Everything else is not worth their time or rigged against them to an unfair advantage. Though, some casinos do offer better than 100% odds on some penny and nickel slots but don't advertise it - they know that if you win $5 on a penny machine, you'll likely be losing it elsewhere - or spending it on food or drinks(try to find a Coke for under $3 in Vegas, let alone a proper one with alcohol in it). Either way they win because you're occupying a seat and making the place look busy for the other tourists. At worst, they give away a few free meals to the locals or co-opt them in to be shills for the same deal - free food and drinks and/or a little cash. Case in point - I have a cousin who is smart enough to win at these games. But she works as a dealer instead and makes a lot more money. The employee perks on food and entertainment are also huge. Tips are a great incentive as well. It's a win-win for everyone. Well, except for the tourists... ;)

That said, it IS a great town for a vacation. Cheap rooms, great shows, loads of conventions, and if you don't mind spending a bit extra, some extremely high-end places to eat. Just don't bother to gamble.

Re:double standard

[Golddess]

GP mentioned the illegality of it. I was going by the whole "beyond the shadow of a doubt" thing in proving you were card counting, which at least as I see it, there's plenty of doubt unless there's a physical device.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

There was a case of someone winning a jackpot a while back and the casino claiming the jackpot was a "software error" after the fact.

Like everyone else, I read about such things with outrage until I actually RTFA. The jackpot she hit was about 100x higher than the maximum the machine was ever supposed to give, so it WAS an error, and obviously so.

Perhaps the owners of said casino should not buy into new technology in a mad dash to control the odds and make more money. Life isn't fair.

The casino is well within it's rights to stop purchasing the faulty equipment-- they are perhaps, though not definitely, within their rights to sue the makers of the machine as it did not perform as advertised and caused severe damages. They are not within their rights to sue or criminally charge consumers.

Think of this happening in another industry. I buy a snack machine, it is defective and gives out two snacks per purchase. Do I arrest the individual who paid for one snack and accidentally got two? How about I buy a defective cash register that gives back too much change, do I arrest my customers for stealing money, or do I go after the manufacturer who made a faulty product? A gas station incorrectly updates the cost of premium gas at 1.00 off (actually happened at one my old jobs), do we arrest people for "stealing" gas, or do we reprimand the employee for setting the price wrong?

Life isn't fair, and as a business owner, sometimes you get bad product, bad service, bad employees. For better or worse, unless in extreme circumstances, I don't see how you can take this out on the consumer. In the case at hand, they didn't even do anything explicitly wrong-- they asked for features, features that are offered by the casino to high rollers, to be enabled. They didn't "hack" into the machine, they didn't slip anyone money to enable "illegal modes" they simply asked to turn on modes freely offered by the casino's through their technicians.

Compounding the problem, of course, is that the gambling industry is notoriously lucrative, and routinely ejects people for no other reason than "winning too much". In the previous example of the gas station, no less than three customers within a few minutes told me of the problem and I was able to correct it. They realized that a mistake had been made, and, though legally in the right, decided to do the "right thing" and let me know a mistake had been made. Casino's treat customers, as demonstrated by this case, like criminals-- despite the fact that they themselves actively try to make the odds worse and worse to make more and more money in an already extremely profitable business. Few people feel ethically inclined to take their side when they find a way to actually "beat the system".

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Just waiting for them to make not gambling, the smartest option, illegal...

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

The converse of the convention market is that you almost never see Math or Physics conferences there because they don't gamble unless THEY have the edge, so Vegas hates them.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. I spent a few days in Vegas. I lost $50 a night which was enough to keep me at the tables drinking free beer until dawn. I'd have spent more in any night club and I wouldn't have chatted with the many people I did from all around the world. With the accommodation only costing $70 for a triple room for me and two mates it was a dirt cheap vacation. Highly recommended.

Re:double standard

[KlomDark]

Was that in 1997? I think I went to the same show. I'd already seen it before as well.

And I'm STILL waiting for the server to bring me the drinks that I ordered. :(

Re:double standard

[anegg]

Don't forget the clawback clause: If you win a big payout, but the casino can show that the payout exceeded the designed-in payout percentage for the machine, the casino gets to cancel your winnings.

To the best of my knowledge, there is no such action taken for all of the losers who were betting money on the "malfunctioning" machine and not winning.

Re:double standard

[isilrion]

Imagine if the casino exploited a bug that displayed "you lose" when the randomizer actually produced a winning combination.

http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_14795166

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Spelling it's as its' is pretty pathetic. I mean, that's never going to be right.

Re:double standard

[Gripp]

gamblers frequently rely on specific sets of superstitious non-sense for luck. for all we know, he may have just simply happened to have won with those settings *one time* and decided that it was his lucky settings, and continued winning; none-the-wiser that there was actually a software glitch behind it all rather than simple luck. Further, knowing how casino's can be towards people who win too much, i kind of don't blame him for having decided that he needs to not draw attention to himself. so, to me, unless they had explicit knowledge of the source code, or a method of injecting code, they didn't do anything wrong.

Re:double standard

[anegg]

To the best of my knowledge, the casino does not refund all bets back to all players on the machine prior to the "payout malfunction." If there is an error that can produce in "incorrect payout" isn't it equally possible that there are errors producing "incorrect losses?" If the casinos can cancel "incorrect" payouts (the concept boggles my mind) but don't correspondingly cancel "incorrect" losses, aren't the casinos taking advantage of software errors?

The only way to have a fair playing field is for the gambling device to be played as it stands, while at the same time taking as many precautions as possible to ensure that it is operating correctly. However, a malfunction that penalizes the casino (big payout) should not be canceled when malfunctions that penalize the gambler (small incremental losses) are not.

If the machine must be "played as is" for both parties, there is some incentive on the part of the casino to produce a more fair machine in addition to the oversight of the gambling commission. I don't think casinos would lose their shirts with this rule in effect, but it would certainly make them more "on the ball."

Re:double standard

[thoromyr]

Have you ever actually seen a slot machine? They are very up front with clear and conspicuous labeling for the rate at which they will fleece you. I don't think I ever saw a machine as low as 85% payout and it has been a few years but I think they were all well above 93%. But regardless, they are marked for their payout rate. It is obvious to any player that a machine marked as 95% payout won't return $4.75 on a $5 pay in, instead most of the time there are losses, but there are staged payout sums that are programmed to result in the rated payout rate on average.

The casinos (at least in Vegas) don't manipulate those numbers, they don't need to. Gamblers are morons and soon parted from their money. Playing slots is more expensive than plunking quarters into an arcade machine, gives you less play time, and its sole thrill is from being parted with your money. But somebody who subverts the system is definitely cheating.

Or would you say that subverting the system by taking illicit notes into a closed-note/book exam is not cheating because the proctor wasn't smart enough to strip search the test takers?

This lack of ethics is why we had a banking crisis. The lack of ethics is why we end up with successively worse oil spills. But its all okay as long as your "sticking it to the man"?

Re:double standard

[jedidiah]

You are blabbering about "history" and I am talking about the present. You've done nothing to demonstrate how Rat Pack Vegas has any relationship to the current state of things.

I suspect the average gangster would be embarrassed by what the Corps do these days.

Re:double standard

[Arccot]

Kind of like counting cards for single deck blackjack. It's illegal to be too smart.

Counting cards isn't actually illegal, at least anywhere I'm aware of. The casinos can ban you from coming back for it, or for any reason they like. I haven't heard of anyone being denied their winnings from counting cards, but I wouldn't be surprised if it does happen sometimes.

Re:double standard

[garyj4]

I would agree with you. But if you RTFA, you will see it was a case of these guys exploiting a 'software error'.

"The pair, according to police, had knowledge of a software glitch in one of the high-bet slot machines. In order to expose the glitch, a special "double-up" feature had to be internally activated. The men persuaded casino technicians to alter "soft" options on the machines, such as volume and screen brightness controls. Such perks aren't unusual for high-rollers, who can wager anywhere from a few hundred to thousands of dollars in one day.

One Meadows employee, who was not criminally charged or accused of wrongdoing, agreed to enable the double-up feature on the machine with the glitch.

Normally, such a feature would allow a player to risk doubling his winnings or potentially losing them all. The double-up feature isn't usually enabled on the machines in part because it's unpopular with most gamblers, who are unwilling to risk large amounts of money.

When the correct sequence of buttons was pushed, the machine displayed false double jackpots. No casino officials noticed because the bogus jackpots weren't being recorded in the machine's internal system.

Throughout April 2009, Mr. Kane frequented Las Vegas casinos, practicing his technique in a "test run," according to authorities, before calling his friend Mr. Nestor in Pennsylvania.

From May 1 to June 15 in 2009, agents said Mr. Nestor joined Mr. Kane in Las Vegas, where the duo allegedly cashed in phony jackpots "over and over again" and perfected a scheme to exploit the same glitch in casinos across the world.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11004/1115414-58.stm#ixzz1AMex9IZo"

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

He was a hero wan't he..

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

That $50 dollar hotel rooms? Cheaper than roadside motels in the middle of nowhere? They're expecting you to spend $50 bucks a day in the casino.

So you're saying they give up dollardollars in order to make back an equivalent amount of dollarbucks?

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

No actually he was just a common asshole that only cared for himself and you are just a common dumbo that bought into his narrative. I bet you love Penn and Teller too.
I thought he was funny that's and that is where it stops.

Re:double standard

[bluefoxlucid]

It does not bring the public into existence in the same way that foreign policy brings a political situation into existence.

Re:double standard

[bluefoxlucid]

Gambling is just a game, with real money. It's a perfectly fine hobby. You spend $200 to go jetskiing for a weekend; why not spend $200 to go gambling? Play the cards, play the slots, play the dice. If you win, you win; if you lose, you go home happy because the games are fun.

It's when you're betting your house and your shirt and ten minutes with your wife trying to win big that it gets to be a problem. People go in with $200 thinking they're going to win big; they don't go in with $200 thinking they're going to spend $200 in exchange for entertainment. If I had a good poker group (see Poker Night at the Inventory ... i.e. people amusing to watch banter), I'd probably throw a $200 buy-in on the table once in a while or a $50 buy-in every weekend to play last man standing. Sure it costs me; but hey what the hell, I get to sit around, have some whiskey, and bullshit for a couple hours. It's fun, I get to watch money move around, I might get busted out early once in a while but oh well. I'll probably lose every night, but that's okay because the money is buy-in and not my little nest egg.

Re:double standard

[StikyPad]

Wrong. It's you, for hacking coins!

Re:double standard

[bluefoxlucid]

Everyone wants as much of your money as they can get for as little effort possible. Every advertisement, next generation, latest product, up sized combo meal, two for one, discount coupon, payment plan, three easy payment, subscription service, limited time offer all have the ultimate goal of getting as much money from you as possible. So why so much hate for the casinos?

This is what I'm talking about. All the god damn time. This is why I want to move to the Japanese countryside. The whole pre-modern China/Japan thing is dead; but the countryside still looks nice, there are no giant god damn televisions plastering the streets, the language is otherworldly to an American, and it lets me get the hell AWAY and live somewhere trapped in an earlier period of time until I DIE. A period when quality was important, not just money and shiny bullshit. Where I can relax and look outside to see a nice yard, a fence, and beyond it a nice landscape.

Re:double standard

[bluefoxlucid]

People play slots because it involves no skill and no thought. Poker and blackjack are skill games.

Re:double standard

[spun]

The man stole from the casino, so I have a point. If you cheat at a game and know you are cheating, you are stealing. He circumvented security measures to cheat. He's a thief.

Re:double standard

[stewbacca]

There's no law that says they are REQUIRED to let everyone gamble.

Yes, there are laws that say a Casino can't refuse service.

I'd like to see the lawsuit against the first casino that refused service to a 40 year old black female Jamaican catholic disabled veteran with children (the federally protected classes).

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Craps is the other game where you have a better than even chance to win. How? Wait for newbies to make sucker bets out of ignorance and bet against them.

Um, what casino do you play at where players are allowed to do that?

Re:double standard

[stewbacca]

And that's the user's fault how? That's the price of doing business. If my company made a $400,000 software mistake, we wouldn't get that money back, why should a casino?

Re:double standard

[spun]

Except I didn't open the door for them, one of my idiot employees did due to the perp's social engineering.

Re:double standard

[spun]

Agreed. There's enough blame for everyone involved to have their share.

Re:double standard

[stewbacca]

No, this is EXACTLY like a locked door, but the guy went to an employee and said, "can you let me in that locked door over there"? Then the employee let him in. He didn't trick the employee into letting him in (no jedi mind tricks or anything), he just asked to be let in, and they did.

Re:double standard

[Stregano]

I am unsure if you read the entire article. They did use some type of 'debug' to ensure winnings. It says in the article that the person would hit a combination of buttons to win. It is like the 4,2,3,1 trick on soda machines to get into the debug menu for them. If I got caught hopping into the debug menu for a soda machine to cash it out, that is illegal. If I get into the debug menu for a soda machine and change the price of everything to 25 cents, that is illegal. It is tampering with the system. These guys hit a combination of buttons to do the same. They were tampering.

Re:double standard

[Stregano]

And to the lucky winner who didn't RTFA:

When the correct sequence of buttons was pushed, the machine displayed false double jackpots. No casino officials noticed because the bogus jackpots weren't being recorded in the machine's internal system.

Re:double standard

[bws111]

You quote a story about someone who thought they won a jackpot but didn't, and then claim she was charged with stealing. She was not, she just didn't get the money. So the only one of your examples is the cash register one. I am quite sure that if you had a store, and the cash register made an error and said that the customer's change is $4 million, you would NOT be giving them $4 million. You would say 'oops, something is wrong here'.

In case you are talking about the actual case the article is about, then you are not being honest in your examples. This was not a case of the customer (player) accidentally got more than he should, it was a case of he found an exploit, tested it over a period of months, got other people involved, and used the exploit at various casinos around the world. So, if you had a snack machine company, and someone found that if you press a certain sequence of buttons the machine would empty it's contents, and that person then went around town emptying your machines, you most certainly would charge that person with stealing (or you're an idiot). If someone comes into your store and confuses the cashier and causes them to give too much change, you certainly are withing your rights to charge that person with theft.

There was a case near my house recently where an ATM was loaded with the wrong denominations, so that it gave out $50s instead of $20s. Most of the people who received money incorrectly notified the bank and gave the money back. The remainder were contacted by the bank, and most of them gave the money back. A few idiots claimed that the mistake was not their problem. They were indeed charged with (and convicted of) theft.

As for your 'notoriously lucrative' comment - got anything to back that up? I just looked up the financials for MGM Resorts International (owner of City Center, Bellagio, MGM Grand, Mandalay Bay, The Mirage, New York-New York, Excalibur, Luxor, Circus Circus et al) and they had a LOSS of $318 Million in the 3 months ending in September ($1.2 BILLION loss YTD). Or maybe you were thinking of Caesars Holdings (owner of Caesars, Harrahs, Ballys, Showboat, Flamingo, Paris, et al)? Seems they had a LOSS of $164 Million in the same quarter, which is better than last year when they had a LOSS of $1.6 BILLION in the same quarter. Quite lucrative indeed.

Re:double standard

[Stregano]

$50 show? Yeah, you have not been to Vegas in awhile. I moved here about 6 months ago, and unless you are going to a small concert somewhere, expect all shows to be a minimum of $100. They are normally in the price range of $125 to $200

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a sad, strange little man, and you have my pity.

Re:double standard

[Actually, I do RTFA]

They don't have to cry to the government to stop you winning by counting cards. They are allowed to simply bar you from gambling at their tables. There's no law that says they are REQUIRED to let everyone gamble.

According to "Bringing Down the House", while most casinos can simply ban you, in Atlantic City they cannot kick you out for counting cards. Oh, they'll enter you in a database that keeps you out of all other casinos, and they'll bring in a fresh deck every hand, and in general they will make it so you cannot win. But then cannot ban you.

Re:double standard

[shadowfaxcrx]

Your guess is wrong. As is the rest of your post.

The high rollers don't win any more than anyone else. They just bet a hell of a lot more money. If you've got a guy coming in dropping 10 grand per roll at the craps table, you're gonna give him a free drink. And probably a free suite. And if you can get away with it, a hooker.

And on the statistically rare occasion that the high roller actually wins something that, too, is good for business. Sure, it costs the casino some money (money which they make up in literally minutes thanks to everyone else in the casino who's losing) but it generates excitement and "That could be me!" attitudes from the other gamblers.

Do you have any idea how much a casino makes? One opened in north Iowa a few years ago. Iowa. Their only clients were farmers and people on Social Security. Cost 20 million to build. They had the loan paid off 2 months after opening. That's 10 million per month only for the loan. Plus the salaries of all the workers, and the profit the owners took off the top. And that was *only* from slot machines. They had a poker room but replaced it with more slot machines because no one in Iowa wanted to play.

If you own a casino you make money faster than you could if you printed it. You don't give a damn if someone wins big - it's a drop in the bucket compared to *your* winnings, and all it does is get the other gamblers to gamble even more.

Re:double standard

[spun]

1. Doesn't matter, the laws against theft apply to commercial enterprises as well.
2. A casino does not invite people to cheat at their slot machines, and socially engineer their staff to reset variables on their slot machines.
3. Cheating is cheating. No one invited the man to cheat. He knew what he was doing was wrong. He hired people to distract the staff. This was illegal, and immoral on his part.

Re:double standard

[bws111]

What are you talking about? How is craps dictated by any players actions? The only thing a player can do is place bets (and one throws the dice). Each player's bets are entirely independent of the other player's (and even their own) bets. Your chances of winning or losing have nothing at all to do with any other player.

Re:double standard

[DavidTC]

That's not gambling. (Vegas actually calls that 'gaming' and tries to imply that all gambling is actually that, but it is not.) Gambling is when you bet money in order to win more money. That is stupid in most circumstances.(1)

If you're just betting money for fun, whatever. That's no more stupid than any other way to spend money for fun.

Heck, when I was walking down the strip, I ducked into a casino to sit down...and sat down at a slot machine by the door and spent $5. Not 'gambled' $5, I certainly expected to lose it. I just wanted a place to sit and watch things and rest, and it was an actual mechanical slot which I found interesting. I played 25 cents at a time until I ran out of the money I put at the start.

I probably would have tried roulette at some point if the table minimums hadn't been $20. Uh, no. I was planning on spending an hour there and maybe spending $20 total.

1) Gambling on stuff like horse races and sporting events isn't quite as stupid, but there is some skill required there. Even poker isn't stupid...some people can consistently make money at poker. And you'll notice that none of those are played against the casino, precisely because smart people can win. Gambling against the casinos is what is stupid.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

This is not illegal. The casino, however, can ask you to leave for any reason. At that point staying or coming back is illegal.

Using an electronic assist is definitely illegal. Don't do that one, even if it's as stupid as a watch calculator.

Re:double standard

[DavidTC]

Oh, and to add....most people like to think they're start 'for fun'...and then play 'until they win', or, more likely, until they run out of money.

People must remember their hourly costs at all time. No entertainment is worth $200 an hour. Movies cost $5, even the most expensive shows cost $60 an hour. Is it that much more fun to watch the roulette ball spin than to watch a magic act or something?

Heck, for that amount of money, in Vegas, you could have taken a cab outside the county and hired a prostitute.

Start with a set amount of time this will entertain you, and a set amount of money you're going to spend.

And with normal people, the cost of entertainment at anywhere but the slots, or one or two bets at craps or roulette, is a pretty high cost to be 'entertained'.

Re:double standard

[DavidTC]

That's because you're not getting them through your hotel.

If they're in the same hotel as you, you can get a pretty good discount, and if they are not, you can usually get a somewhat reasonable discount via an agreement between your hotel and theirs.

They don't care about residents. Residents don't gamble.

Re:double standard

[kheldan]

They don't give any real value for your money.

Re:double standard

[ultranova]

Yes I know I'm taking the naive approach but too many people are jumping on the injustice bandwagon over a sensationalist article that has been misleadingly summed up and sensationalised some more. The top payout on the machine is 251,000 and she won 41,900,000.

Doesn't really matter. The way I've heard lately, they wouldn't pay 251,000 either. It's always glitch if you win.

Which rises an interesting question: how long until people decide to stop going to casinos altogether since there's not even a theoretical chance of victory, and how unpleasant conversation will the greedy people who caused this have as a result ?-)

Imagine you bid $20 on a pair of jeans on some auction site but a cat on keyboard malfunction caused you to bid 20 million instead. Now the seller is suing you for the 20 million you promised.

Or let's imagine you bid $20 on a pair of jeans, get them, then decide you don't like them after all and claim that you only meant to bid 20 cents. Now you're suing the seller to pay back your $19.80.

Hardly seems fair to be able to force you to somehow try and pay this off over the rest of your life now does it?

Won't someone please think of the poor wittle casinos? It's just as obvious that winning in a casino is a mistake than bidding $20 million for a pair of jeans!

Are you astroturfing or just plain dumb?

Re:double standard

[ultranova]

And on the statistically rare occasion that the high roller actually wins something that, too, is good for business. Sure, it costs the casino some money (money which they make up in literally minutes thanks to everyone else in the casino who's losing) but it generates excitement and "That could be me!" attitudes from the other gamblers.

And yet this isn't the first story of a casino refusing to pay someone's winnings on Slashdot. I guess "Greedy Stupid" is the most common alignment of humanity...

Re:double standard

[dcw3]

LOL! My guess is that the high rollers are actually paying for all the free crap. Do you honestly think the casinos are going to be encouraging the big players to come to their casinos if they're winning? Sheeez!

Actually, they do. The casinos rarely pay attention to the amount won/lost by any individual player, but focus more on average bet size and time played. This is because they know the actuarial odds, and know how much they expect to win over time based upon the math. In keeping track of those numbers, they're simply determining how much "action" the player is giving them, and how much in "comps" they're willing to give them. The only reason they'll pay attention to someone's winnings is if foul play is suspected.

I won't claim to be an expert, but as a point of reference, I've been going to Vegas every year since the 70s, and been "comp'ed" free rooms, and shows. I have family friends who are well off, and flown out there at the casino's expense...my dad's buddy plays high stakes craps, and is expected to play a certain number of hours for those freebies. They used to be much easier to get when the mob ruled the town...the corporate takeover of Vegas, has cut that back very considerably.

Re:double standard

[ultranova]

Play the cards, play the slots, play the dice. If you win, you win; if you lose, you go home happy because the games are fun.

If you lose, you go home happy, if you win, you'll be arrested.

It seems that the only winning move is not to play. What a strange game.

Re:double standard

[dcw3]

Depends...recommend the wiki article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Card_counting

Re:double standard

[dcw3]

Jesus, don't you know anything about the history of Las Vegas? The Corps ARE the Mob.

Nah. The mob actually treated it's customers much nicer. You just didn't want to cross them.

Re:double standard

[Foobar of Borg]

And that's the user's fault how? That's the price of doing business. If my company made a $400,000 software mistake, we wouldn't get that money back, why should a casino?

Because your company doesn't own the local government and have dirt on all the politicians and judges.

Re:double standard

[Anomalyst]

Additionally, as a result of the antics that the movie kinda/sorta depicted most casinos have gone to a six deck shoe and barred buying in in the middle of a shoe. There are some casinos that still have two deck shoes (this info is over 6 months old) Flamingo $20 min bet and Wynn, autos-huffler $100 min (that means you should have a $4500 min session bankroll). All that tedious counting and concentration, at the mercy ov statistical variance until the shoe (occasionally) turns in your favor in a struggle to gain a 1.5% or so edge. I'll take a lively game of craps, 1.41% against you on a passline backed with a free odds bet, even lower on a 10x or better odds table. Do a web search on "dice influencing", in particular checkout CrapsFest.com DiceInstitute.com (has an appreciable number of Chicago shooters plaihng at Indiana border casinos) and DiceCoach.com for videos and personal instruction in Vegas. Drop my handle as a referral. Get John Patricks "Advanced Craps" for a good low bankroll ($100) strategy.

Re:double standard

[bluefoxlucid]

The trick is the casinos keep a good percentage of the money they keep (10% is a lot!). They do shift the money around though. If you happen to play conservatively and win a modest amount, they're fine with you really; if you seem to be WELL outside the statistical bounds due to visible behavior (card counting etc), they may be a little irritated. If you're caught cheating, they will be PISSED.

I've considered learning all kinds of card counting and keeping the winnings to a minimum, then tossing some 50% of my winnings on the table if I make out good and telling everyone else to have fun. If the pit boss approaches me I'll just tell them, hey, I get my entertainment running every card counting strategy I can find, play small ($200 bankroll), win modest (double my money), and toss some back. I'd think they'd mostly not have a problem with me as long as A) I don't teach anyone ELSE to card count; and B) I don't come around to make this week's wages. Plus throwing chips back appeases the other players and keeps them around longer (to spend someone else's money) so hell, why not?

The poker tables would be the only other fun place to play, really, with the dealer out of it. House rules take on rake, I get 95% of the pot and the house keeps 5%. They don't care if I'm winning as long as I'm not cheating. I don't see why they don't do table blackjack the same way, split the pot between winners based on bet-in. House takes 5% of the pot, automatically. For each person that wins, add up the percentage that they put into the pot and the house takes 50% of what's left; split the remaining 50% between the other two. Minimum bet is always going to be something like 10% of the total pot. Then the house can't lose and card counters can go wild.

Re:double standard

[SleazyRidr]

The machines are under the control of the casino. Any bugs in them are the casino's responsibility.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

tits are a snack, there is nothing as fulfilling as sucking on a tits in the afternoon !

Re:double standard

[bws111]

Really? So if your company's payroll system made an error and deposited $400,000 extra in your bank account, you think they wouldn't get that back? Or if their accounts payable system paid someone too much, they wouldn't get that back? I call bullshit.

Re:double standard

[Ghengis Khak]

I see your point about how a reduction of options (of which a monopoly would be the degenerate case) could make something _seem_ compulsory. Eg, if you lived in an apartment building and therefore couldn't grow your own food, and there was only 1 grocery store within 50 miles you might as well have a gun to your head with respect to where you buy food.

So for the sake of argument suppose we equate a lack of options with compulsion. Still how does this apply to casinos? You don't need a casino to live or even to be entertained. Casinos have certain (state-granted) monopoly-like privileges to let them corner the gambling market in many ways, but they don't have a monopoly on anything critical like food, utilities, or entertainment.

Not trying to be argumentative or anything, just trying to see where you're coming from.

Re:double standard

[bws111]

There are laws that say she can't be banned for BEING a "40 year old black female Jamaican catholic disabled veteran with children". She CAN be banned for any other reason, just like everyone else.

Re:double standard

[shadowfaxcrx]

The payouts on slot machines and even games of "skill" (which are still weighted in favor of the casino) are calculated and expected. Payouts on slot machines that are programmed wrong and paying out too often are not. That's why this casino got pissy.

They're still wrong to bring charges, though.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

The link you posted was in fact a software error.

The award the patron was supposed to receive was set to -1 in code, and the award variable was an unsigned 32-bit value. It resulted in awarding the player 4294967296 credits or $42,949,672.96 on a penny slot machine. The same thing happened in the second link provided in summary.

Re:double standard

[BraksDad]

...Also remember: in a gambling town, the cops and judges aren't paid by the local government...

WHAT? no way dude, the Mafia always plays fair.

Re:double standard

[stewbacca]

Too true, too true.

Re:double standard

[stewbacca]

Call bs if you want but that's not what I said.

Re:double standard

[stewbacca]

But the above post says casinos can ban people for "any" reason, not any "other" reason as you've correctly pointed out.

Re:double standard

[Kitkoan]

Well here is a report from 2007 stating that Diebold machines are not secure (with some of the study being published in 2006). And here is a report in 2008 (a year later) showing of not only warnings not to use the Diebold machines, but lists 2 different incidents (both in 2008) where Diebold machines caused problems with votes.

Re:double standard

[Plekto]

Concerning playing the Don't Pass line, there's a reason that almost all casinos require you to pay a 5% commission and/or make a 2 or 12 a push - because it raises their odds to enough to not always lose money. (it's about 3.6% in your favor otherwise to bet against the shooter) In any case, it's still a fraction of a percent better to bet this way.

It's considered the "wrong way to play the game" but statistically can have its advantages. You piss off the other players while doing it, though, and are really acting as a spoiler. But so what. ;)

http://www.nextshooter.com/vegas
The trick is to do this at the right casino. ;)
http://www.nextshooter.com/odds
And make the right Free Odds bet at the proper time. Yes, that's a shockingly low .014% margin at that one casino. They allow it because they know that 99% of players won't take advantage of it, since it's a very advanced technique.

Re:double standard

[cbiltcliffe]

But the above post says casinos can ban people for "any" reason,

Actually, no, it doesn't. It simply says:

They are allowed to simply bar you from gambling at their tables. There's no law that says they are REQUIRED to let everyone gamble.

Considering the context this statement was made in, it's pretty obvious that it's referring to barring someone for counting cards, rather than "any reason" as you claim.

Re:double standard

[HiMorons]

I don't think you understand "free market" if you think it accepts fraud as legitimate.

Re:double standard

[cbiltcliffe]

No they don't. I just won it from them, dammit!!!

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

Counting cards is NOT ILLEGAL. That is the impression that the media and the casinos want you to have. The move 21 pissed me off so much because of this impression that it is illegal to count cards. As long as you are only using your memory and not any type of device then it is legal.

Get caught counting cards in Vegas and the worst the casino can do to you is ask you to leave and refuse you any further business. Whatever money you have already won is yours.

Andy Bloch, for you poker fans, is an ex-MIT Blackjack Team member. He plays in some of the big limit poker games but still cannot play at the casino's regular tables.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

"Also remember: in a gambling town, the cops and judges aren't paid by the local government. They're paid by the casinos. Period."

My father was a judge in Las Vegas, Nevada, for a number of years. And you are quite misinformed, at least in regards to Vegas. Thinking that all local politicians, police, and judges are paid by the casinos is just plain naive, if not outright stupid.

Re:double standard

[trum4n]

They kill people. Remember that.

Re:double standard

[AGMW]

Oh, OK. Sorry, my mistake. So the 'freebies' given to the high rollers are only paid for out of the money lost on the nickel and dime slots and not, in any way, by the money lost by the high rollers.

Thanks for clearing that up.

"Free". "Free". You keep using that word but I do not think you know what it means.

Re:double standard

[AGMW]

Sorry, my bad. What I meant was ..
Do you honestly think the casinos are going to be encouraging the big players to come to their casinos if they're always winning?

As we already know, anyone who always wins is politely asked to go visit some other casino.

Re:double standard

[damaged_sectors]

He's done nothing wrong? Hmm, what is your street address? You DO realize that your security has a flaw, right? Lock bumping makes it trivially easy for me to break in to your house and take your stuff. Not to mention, I bet you have your windows made of glass. Obviously, you won't mind if I use your security errors to profit from you, right? You do? Isn't this the free market at work? If it's a problem, buy a better lock. If you don't buy a better lock, I'm justified in taking your stuff.

Ridiculum absolutem?

By your (distorted) logic if I happen to see a laptop that normally sells for $900 marked as $90 I should not buy it? Or are you suggesting that I pay $900 for it? What if I ask the shop assistant to put 6 of them aside for me, so I can send family members back to buy them later?

In fact the law says (in Australia) the retailer must sell it to me at the marked price except in circumstances where the marked price is higher than it should be (new stock has higher duties, doesn't apply to old stock etc). The retailer also has an obligation to the shareholders to correctly price/advertise the stock - for all the supposed luck involved the casino/betting operator has the same obligations. IANAL but neither do I get my legal opinions from my arse (or television). The reason for said ticket price law is not soley to ensure that the consumer gets the goods at the marked (advertised) price, but to conteract the common over and inconsistent pricing (eg. two different prices in the same store for same item, 500g cheese costing less per gram than 1kg of cheese, and other distortions of true value). Gaming the consumer is common, catching and punishing the company is hard - hence the "as advertised" law. Profit comes at a price and the onus is/should be on the one that profits to match the promise to the fact - and posted disclaimers be damned. Another reason for penalizing pricing/advertising "mistake" that favour consumers is to counteract "price war" advantages existing players (retailers) have over other players.

The home owner in your straw man promised you nothing - didn't invite you on their premises, and aside from a common law duty to allow innocent trespass (wrong house) and care (request assistance in emergency) the only thing you can expect from them is a call to the police and/or a beating.

I find it difficult tho believe that such a significantly biased argument such of yours is not through a failure to display "good faith".

Disclaimer: I'm an ex-publican - one reason for the "ex" is pokie machines *which* are most certainly rigged - something the manufacturers and distributors are quick to point out.

Re:double standard

[damaged_sectors]

That's the dumbest analogy I've ever read.

And you'd have to be the biggest, dumbest, hypocrite I've come across in a long time.

As it is, I say they are screwing us, so we should take any opportunity to screw them.

Re:double standard

[shadowfaxcrx]

Don't try to twist out of it now that you know you're wrong. You said you "guess" the high rollers are *paying for* the free crap. Not "paying for losing at gambling and then getting stuff given to them." The money they spend is for gambling. The blackjack table doesn't say "$100 gets you a hand of cards and a martini."

Re:double standard

[nblender]

I've always wanted to go to Las Vegas. Not for the gambling or the shows but apparently there are a bunch of interesting sites near the place... Hoover Dam for example... And apparently there's some sort of chicken ranching operation as well... Sounds like a cheap vacation for the whole family..

Re:double standard

[OldHawk777]

By proxy or law/policy?

Re:double standard

[OldHawk777]

My point is whats good for one is good for all, but governance and law these days make exceptions for casinos, CEOs, Hedge Funds....

What is good for the very few is not considered good for the many.

Re:double standard

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree. I can card count. I can do it in my head without the need for using fingers or anything. It annoys me when a casino can knowingly introduce games which have buggy code and end up in their favor but when a patron is smart enough and learns a skill well enough he or she can be prosecuted...

the other thing I am surprised about is that buggy code does not come back to the manufacturers. Casino looses money due to buggy code. Casino sues machine manufacturer. Seems straight forward enough to me.

Re:double standard

[ps2os2]

In the IT industry there are a subset of people who do a LOT of math. 30 or so years ago they had their convention in Vegas. It was a tremendous large event however very few of the sessions had people in them. Most of the people were in the casino's trying to win.

After that, the group took Las Vegas off the possibility of places to attend. Its hard to compete when you have more people think they are smarter at winning that trying to leard new methods of using math to do your every day job.

What's next?

[ErikPeterson]

Getting sued for picking the winning loto numbers?

Re:What's next?

[Daengbo]

The only way to win is to not play.

Re:What's next?

[jfengel]

If you had some inside knowledge of how the lotto numbers were picked, yes.

They're charging him with fraud. It remains to be shown how he got knowledge of the glitch, and if he merely exploited a pattern he was able to observe, that charge may well not stick. But if he hacked the machines to gain information he wasn't supposed to have, it sounds like fraud to me, whether it was the lotto machine or a slot machine.

Re:What's next?

[Monkeedude1212]

Well it's a LITTLE more complicated than that... FTFA:

In order to expose the glitch, a special "double-up" feature had to be internally activated. The men persuaded casino technicians to alter "soft" options on the machines, such as volume and screen brightness controls. Such perks aren't unusual for high-rollers, who can wager anywhere from a few hundred to thousands of dollars in one day.

One Meadows employee, who was not criminally charged or accused of wrongdoing, agreed to enable the double-up feature on the machine with the glitch.

Normally, such a feature would allow a player to risk doubling his winnings or potentially losing them all. The double-up feature isn't usually enabled on the machines in part because it's unpopular with most gamblers, who are unwilling to risk large amounts of money.

When the correct sequence of buttons was pushed, the machine displayed false double jackpots. No casino officials noticed because the bogus jackpots weren't being recorded in the machine's internal system.

Throughout April 2009, Mr. Kane frequented Las Vegas casinos, practicing his technique in a "test run," according to authorities, before calling his friend Mr. Nestor in Pennsylvania.

From May 1 to June 15 in 2009, agents said Mr. Nestor joined Mr. Kane in Las Vegas, where the duo allegedly cashed in phony jackpots "over and over again" and perfected a scheme to exploit the same glitch in casinos across the world.

So they noticed a glitch in the system - one that allowed them to get a Jackpot without it being reported or investigated. They then went worldwide with this to get as much money as they could before getting caught.

Now, don't get me wrong, a bug in the system shouldn't be the fault of the player, and definately shouldn't result in Criminal Charges, I'd even say taking back the winnings is a bit harsh though it depends on the scenario (obviously guys exploiting a flaw should give back all the money, a person experiencing the glitch once shouldn't have to give any of it back).

But claiming that they are completely innocent in this scheme sets a bad precedent. Oh, this website didn't secure their Logins for SQL injection, it's not MY fault the series of buttons I pressed resulted in me accessing their database records. Oh, metasploit showed me a new Microsoft zero day exploit, its not MY fault I got admin access to the webserver by simply pressing the correct keys!

TL;DR - Just because the Casino claims that the player won by a glitch doesn't mean the Casino is evil and the player is being ripped off. Yeah, it's not their fault there is a glitch, but if the player repeatedly exploits it instead of reporting it, you have to expect some sort of consequences.

Re:What's next?

[fruitbane]

If he hacked a machine he owned or had access to, what does it matter if the manufacturer intended him to be aware of the glitches or not? As far as I know it's not illegal to have insider knowledge unless the law expressly forbids it, and in this case I'm not sure the law does. The glitch in the slot machine software/firmware was certainly not a way the mfg or casino intended for users to interact with their machines, but so what? I think proving fraud may be difficult for federal authorities unless the men had a number of other actions to pursue. Taking advantage of a slot machine glitch alone is, or at least should be, insufficient in and of itself.

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

true..

but i'll be honest in that i could care less if casinos lose on an exploit like this. how many lives have they ruined and people they have taken advantage of? just saying.. they don't call it gambling for nothing.. ;)

btw, yea, i suck at gambling..

Re:What's next?

[Monkeedude1212]

Oh yeah - I don't have any sympathy for the Casinos they've always been stealing for as long as they've been around.

But two wrongs don't make a right, stealing from a Casino does not make you a good guy (Despite how much you may like Ocean's 11).

And making these guys sound like victims is more whats bothering me. They clearly played it like Con-men what with getting Casino technicians to alter the machines.

Re:What's next?

[CrazyJim1]

I live in PA, and from what I hear, he had an inside man alter the software so he could hit time after time. The guy isn't innocent. The thing I typically hear people say is,"They shouldn't have taken so much money down at once or they wouldn't have got caught." My line of thinking is you shouldn't be cheating anyone even casinos.

Re:What's next?

[H0p313ss]

So they noticed a glitch in the system - one that allowed them to get a Jackpot without it being reported or investigated. They then went worldwide with this to get as much money as they could before getting caught.

Which AFAIK is fraud, plain and simple.

When exactly did Slashdot go from "News For Nerds" to "Emo Whiner Central" ?

Re:What's next?

[Elder Entropist]

If he hacked a machine he owned or had access to, what does it matter if the manufacturer intended him to be aware of the glitches or not? As far as I know it's not illegal to have insider knowledge unless the law expressly forbids it

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) makes it illegal.

Re:What's next?

[owlstead]

The difference being that winning jackpots isn't illegal like the other practices you mention. I've also got a bit of an issue with "false jackpots". I've unfortunately never encountered one, and I'll be damned if I am going to use that term *ever*.

Re:What's next?

[0123456]

Which AFAIK is fraud, plain and simple.

How is that 'fraud'? You press buttons on a slot machine and money comes out... where does the fraud come in?

Re:What's next?

[hairyfeet]

While I agree with part of what you are saying, on the other hand we should be careful not to reward shitty design by making it criminal to exploit it. I mean look at DMCA where ANY encryption, even something as lame and completely bogus as ROT13 could possibly get you busted for "circumventing" it. Or that guy being sued for accessing the hockey game even though they put it on a server with NO authentication methods that would let anyone that knew or found the IP address to help themselves.

And finally let us not forget this is casinos we are talking about, places where the odds are so badly stacked against the player that if anyone that didn't have the blessing of the state tried to set up a similar gaming operation they would be busted for fraud, and rightly so. The last thing we need is to give them an excuse to not to have to pay out what little they do pay without having to go through a bunch of legal hoops. After all as another poster pointed out that actually worked on slot machine code all the code is shitty so one could argue that ANY significant payout could be attributed to "software glitch" and with piss poor badly managed code that would be a legitimate argument.

The odds are already so badly stacked on most of them games you'd have better odds at 3 Card Monty, so I'm just worried about setting a precedent that gives them even BETTER than the already overwhelming advantage they already have. Hell I'd already argue most of those games are legalized robbery, do we really need to let them slide for not bothering to have decent code written as well?

Re:What's next?

[mangu]

Oh, this website didn't secure their Logins for SQL injection, it's not MY fault the series of buttons I pressed resulted in me accessing their database records.

That's absolutely correct and that's how it should be.

There was a fault in the system, the result of incomplete testing by incompetent programmers. That's what happens when you hire the lowest degree of people, instead of paying the wages required by competent people.

Consider this: suppose the fault in the system caused a crash that killed someone. Shouldn't the manufacturer be liable for that damage, caused by a design error? Isn't the manufacturer responsible for the consequences of the design their engineers came up with?

Why should software be exempt from the liability that car manufacturers face?

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

how many lives have they ruined and people they have taken advantage of?

It's not like someone put a gun to their head and made them walk into a casino.

Anyone walking into a casino thinking they will win has already lost, and their life was likely already ruined.

Re:What's next?

[Monkeedude1212]

Because you can then claim vehicular homicide on faults due to the manufacturer?

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

When exactly did Slashdot go from "News For Nerds" to "Emo Whiner Central" ?

Somewhere around 2003/2004.

Re:What's next?

[Monkeedude1212]

When you convince Casino Employees to activate certain features just so you can exploit a glitch.

At that point it goes into a very grey shaded area.

Re:What's next?

[zach_the_lizard]

How have casinos been stealing from people? If you have above a room temperature IQ, you should have some idea that the odds are stacked against you from the very start. Any wins you get will eventually be washed away by losses. And many people know this, and play willingly. Absent casinos hiring people to grab random people, hold them at gunpoint, and take their money, I see no theft.

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

You press buttons on a slot machine and money comes out... where does the fraud come in?

I came across an ATM that still had an active session...

I found an iPad in the Apple store that was logged into gmail...

I sat down at a library computer and found someone's brokerage account...

Re:What's next?

[san_SS!]

The only way to win is to not play.

Correction: The only way to win is to not play by the rules(and not get caught).

Re:What's next?

[vux984]

There was a fault in the system, the result of incomplete testing by incompetent programmers. That's what happens when you hire the lowest degree of people, instead of paying the wages required by competent people.

Virtually all testing is incomplete, especially for simple consumer oriented stuff. And even competent programmers still make errors.

Why should software be exempt from the liability that car manufacturers face?

No one said it should be exempt. But if you buy a bunch of Pinto's KNOWING of the flaw, and then deliberately crash them into things to try and make them explode so that you can sue the manufacturer... why exactly should you be exempt from liability?

Re:What's next?

[Monkeedude1212]

Counting cards results in you losing your winnings. That's one way.

Otherwise, it's no more theft than a phishing attack is stealing people's login info - they play off the gullibility of those without the knowledge of whats really happening.

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

They're comparing it to other software cases where you agree on an EULA like in games or other software where clauses like that exist. In this case I'm pretty sure he didn't sign or agree to anything.

Re:What's next?

[mick232]

If the lotto numbers are picked as they're supposed to, then the process is completely random. There's no knowledge one could have to predict anything. Now, if the picking process is NOT random, then who's at fault? The lotto company is at least as guilty as anyone exploiting that.

Re:What's next?

[kheldan]

The bottom line for this story really is that if you're in a Casino, you can be thrown out for no reason at any time at all without them having to prove anything to anyone, and there's not a damned thing you can do about it. These guys are lucky that they weren't just taken into a back room somewhere to have the shit beat out of them and/or killed instead of just arrested. Regardless of what happens to them legally, they'll never be allowed in any casino ever again because of this.

Re:What's next?

[thatskinnyguy]

The quickest way to double your money is to fold it and put it back in your pocket - Will Rogers

Re:What's next?

[mangu]

But if you buy a bunch of Pinto's KNOWING of the flaw, and then deliberately crash them into things to try and make them explode so that you can sue the manufacturer... why exactly should you be exempt from liability?

The Pinto had a design fault in that the fuel tank wasn't well protected from rear-end crashes. The manufacturer was found liable for *any* damages caused by that fault, independent of what caused the accident.

Ford had to have protected better the fuel tank, no matter what. They could not claim that the accident wouldn't have occurred if one of the drivers involved had been more careful.

The conclusion was that accidents happen and the manufacturer had the responsibility to take that into account, no matter what caused the accident.

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

i think if you can count cards, you should be able to use that skill. fuck those multi-pack black jack tables.

Re:What's next?

[chaboud]

Counting cards doesn't result in you losing your winnings. If discovered, it likely results in your being barred from that casino (and many others). Still, as long as you're not using an assistive device, counting cards is completely legal.

Re:What's next?

[chaboud]

In this case, he's playing the game as intended, with a setting exposed by the manufacturer (and casino). If he had a hand in placing the vulnerability, sure, he's guilty as sin. If he just noticed and played an exploit through the buttons on the machine, that's hardly fraud.

There's no misrepresentation in winning.

Re:What's next?

[westlake]

Oh yeah - I don't have any sympathy for the Casinos they've always been stealing for as long as they've been around.

It doesn't matter whether you are headed for Vegas or Friday Night BINGO at the Catholic Church.

There are two - and only two - ways the house can make a profit.

1 The odds favor the house.

2 The house takes a percentage of the action.

If the size of your bundle you want to increase,
I'll arrange that you go broke in quiet and peace,
In a hideout provided by Nathan, where there are no neighbors to squawk,
It's the oldest established permanent floating crap game in New Yawk.
Where's the action? Where's the game?
Gotta have the game or we'll die from shame.
Oh the good old reliable Nathan, Nathan, Nathan, Nathan Detroit
It's the oldest established permanent floating crap game in New York. [Guys and Dolls, 1950]

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, no, no.... That's nuclear war. Sheesh.

Re:What's next?

[fruitbane]

Under the DMCA, they would have to prove that HE hacked a unit to get at that information. The information on the glitch itself isn't protected by law.

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

The only way to win is to not play.

The only way to play is not to win.

FTFY

Re:What's next?

[turbidostato]

"How have casinos been stealing from people?"

By letting them think that if the win, they win when the reality is that if they loss, they loss but if they win they should return the winnins and face federal charges.

"If you have above a room temperature IQ, you should have some idea that the odds are stacked against you from the very start."

So what? What if you in fact have an above room temperature IQ and you find a within the specs way to leverage those odds that were stacked against you in your favour? I.e.: seeing that a roulette is biased towards some numbers, counting the cards in jackpot, finding a glitch in the slots machines, etc?

The casino already has a fair advantage to start with and simply methods to lessen damage (they patch the bug on the slot machine, they change the failing roulette, they use more card decks, etc.) so why they need federal protection and tax money to rise their odds even more?

Re:What's next?

[h4rr4r]

Where does it say that you may not find software bugs?

Re:What's next?

[h4rr4r]

Why?
They can easily refuse, hell why does the casino not have some procedure for this? I bet they do and they allowed this change.

Re:What's next?

[vux984]

The Pinto had a design fault in that the fuel tank wasn't well protected from rear-end crashes. The manufacturer was found liable for *any* damages caused by that fault, independent of what caused the accident.

Ford had to have protected better the fuel tank, no matter what. They could not claim that the accident wouldn't have occurred if one of the drivers involved had been more careful.

I don't disagree.

The conclusion was that accidents happen and the manufacturer had the responsibility to take that into account, no matter what caused the accident.

Again I don't disagree.

But when someone buys 100s of them and deliberately blows them up its not an accident anymore, and those cars clearly shouldn't be solely fords liability.

Re:What's next?

[Skidborg]

The point is that the machine in this case should be absolutely immune to being exploited in this way. If they stand to lose millions if they run glitchy software, then they shouldn't be running glitchy software now, should they?

Re:What's next?

[KingAlanI]

Technically, that's indeed the best way to win, but unlike nuclear war, people occasionally win at the lottery.

Re:What's next?

[zippthorne]

I think even exploiting the flaw is fine, depending on how the gambler comes by the knowledge; if he discovered through careful observation, I don't think there's anything fraudulent or criminal about it in any way. I realize the legal system may disagree, but that doesn't make me wrong and the system right, from a moral point of view.

Now, if he discovered the flaw by working for the company that manufacturers the machines, then I can see that there might be a problem, depending on whether he went out to profit from the disc right away, or spent months trying to tell his employer about it before finally giving up.

For it to be gambling, there has to be a risk. For the casinos, that includes the risk that the game is exploitably flawed. The law should not insulate one party from having to do due dilligence to make sure the game really is fair, and especially should not insulate the party that actually has the resources and access to credibly investigate it.

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

Reporting it? Nonsense! If I were to sell you a car of which the odometer reads 10K , and it turns out to have gone only 5K, that's stupid of me and lucky for you. I can't suddenly -after the fact- come after you and charge you more because I discovered I f*cked up.

Re:What's next?

[Daengbo]

Thanks

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

Again I don't disagree.

But when someone buys 100s of them and deliberately blows them up its not an accident anymore, and those cars clearly shouldn't be solely fords liability.

Ok ... so who is doing that? Name names please. Also explain why they weren't charged with first-degree murder like any other time a person knowingly and premeditatively causes the death of another. I dare you. Back your point up or admit you're full of shit. Pick one, coward.

Re:What's next?

[Gaygirlie]

Oh, this website didn't secure their Logins for SQL injection, it's not MY fault the series of buttons I pressed resulted in me accessing their database records. Oh, metasploit showed me a new Microsoft zero day exploit, its not MY fault I got admin access to the webserver by simply pressing the correct keys!

Experiencing a glitch in a slot machine and taking advantage of it is quite a different thing.. He is not accessing any part of the machine or its software that he isn't meant to access, whereas in the case of for example someone using SQL injection and gaining system admin he would be accessing parts that were clearly not meant for general access. Then there's the whole breach of security thing and all that, whereas none of that applies to a slot machine. Using someone else's credentials for logging in to parts of a system which you know weren't meant for general access simply is a whole different thing.

IMHO if there is a glitch in the slot machine and the glitch can be accessed by using the machine as it was intended then the whole fault lies with the owner, not the user. If the glitch was accessible through a method that clearly wasn't intended, or through unsanctified modifications to the system, then it would lie with the user. In this case all the things he did were wholly sanctified and not a single step in the process was illegal or uncondoned of or unintended and it's really not his fault that they resulted in an unexpected outcome.

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seems like they're blaming the wrong guys. The casinos should be in civil courts against the machine manufacturers for selling faulty equipment. I think this is yet another story that is going to get chalked up to "Might makes right." Increasingly, that is the case these days and I don't see it getting better soon.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of Authoritaria and to the enslavement for which it stands. This great plantation, under Wall Street demi-gods invinicible, with debt and oppression for all.

Re:What's next?

[91degrees]

This complicates things a lot.

He asked for a feature to be enabled, knowing that this enabled an exploit, without their knowledge. So, he abused a trust in order to gain an advantage.

I can see a case for this being fraud.

Re:What's next?

[hashwolf]

What's even better is that you can prove that. Kind of.

Tell anyone to keep a tally of how much they spend and how much they win when playing. If they tell you that you logic is flawed because they can win more than they spend... *dare* them to prove you wrong in practice!

The more they try to prove you wrong, the more you will be proving your point.

Re:What's next?

[L4t3r4lu5]

He's being sarcastic. The quote is "The only winning move is not to play."

How about a nice game of chess?

Re:What's next?

[L4t3r4lu5]

If I press keys on my keyboard at random, and magically I happen to enter your online banking URL, account number, and password, then empty your bank account, that's fraud. I only interacted with the system in the way it was designed, and did not alter the system in any way.

This guy had an unpopular feature activated which exposed a flaw. How about I get your bank to allow printing of statements to PDF, but the output screen for that has a link to a money transfer mechanism which isn't included in your statement? BAM money gone, no trace. This is an analogy of what they did.

Re:What's next?

[Chapter80]

Technically, that's indeed the best way to win, but unlike nuclear war, people occasionally win at the lottery.

Wrong.

There are times (quite frequently, actually), when the lottery jackpot is large enough to force the expected value of any bet to be in favor of the bettor. Just this week, the odds of winning Mega Millions was 176 Million to 1, but the cash payout for a single winner jackpot was $224 Million on a one dollar ticket.

So the expected return of a *smart* one dollar bet is $1.27, clearly in the favor of the bettor, and much expected returns than the casinos make on the average bet. So you can actually perform better than casinos in the long run (who, everybody agrees, have the odds stacked in their favor), through smart, selective betting on lotteries.

I mention *smart* bet, because the trick is to try to avoid sharing the jackpot. You can't control what numbers are drawn; every combination of numbers supposedly has approximately equal odds of appearing. But you CAN control the likelihood of sharing the jackpot. If you assume that the combination 1-2-3-4-5, 6 is as likely to come up as some seemingly random combination, like 4-8-15-25-27, 42, then the game becomes "how can I pick a number combination that no one else is likely to pick?"

When people select their own numbers, there are definite tendencies. You want to avoid those tendencies. Here are some of them:

- Many people bet based on dates - birthdays, anniversaries, etc. So the numbers 1 through 31 (and especially 1 through 12) should be avoided.
- People's "lucky numbers" are generally far more likely to be lower rather than higher. 6 is more likely than 43. There are, of course exceptions to this rule (like 7 is more likely to be selected than 1, 14 is more likely than 13 (considered by many to be unlucky), and certain higher numbers, like 42 are selected at a slightly higher frequency than you'd expect).
- Most people tend to avoid sequences, like 1-2-3-4-5. (The issue with this rule is that there are a small number of consecutive sequences, so it's too risky to just bet consecutive sequences, as more than 100 people know these tactics.)

There are many other tendencies that have been studied. All you need to do is bet on number combinations that others are not likely to bet on. And there are a lot of such combinations, so it's not likely that you will be picking the same numbers as other Slashdot readers who are trying to bet smart.

I should also mention the tax consequences. You may argue that the $1.27 winnings will be taxable, cutting it approximately in half, and making it a losing bet. Since documented gambling losses are deductible against your gambling winnings in many jurisdictions, this argument doesn't hold up. It may cut the $1.27 expected value down to $1.135 (not $0.635), but it's still a bet that is in the bettor's favor.

Go forth and gamble!

Re:What's next?

[Chapter80]

Oops.. I meant to quote the guy who said that the only way to win was to not play.

You weren't wrong, your parent was. (But aren't all parents wrong?)

Re:What's next?

[camazotz]

In another field of software testing these guys might be considered beta testers....

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

The only way to win is to not play.

How about a nice game of chess Professor Falken?

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Right vs Wrong" is probably not the best way to come at this issue. "Responsability" is probably far more resonable. Whos responsability is it to ensure that the games are not faulty, The Casino? The State? The player? I think you'd have a hard time argueing that the player is responable for finding, reporting, and or fixing faults in the machines. I'm also curious if there are any statistics on how often casino machines are found to be faulty, in the Casino's favor. And what, if any, punishment occurses in these cases.

Re:What's next?

[Vornzog]

Typical, short-sighted, pure-expectation value reasoning, that only applies if the value of a dollar is absolute.

The only way to have any chance to win is not to play much.

I play the lottery - just very infrequently. Let's say I play 20 times, total, over the course of my whole life, paying just one dollar for one set of numbers each time. My 'expected winnings' is a bit less than $10, but my most likely outcome is $0 for me, a $10 donation to support open space/wildlife/etc and a $10 donation to J. Random Lotto Player, based on the skewed payout schedule. That $20 I'm out represents zero risk to my financial well being - I've lost more than that in random pockets of an old jacket, and never missed it. In return, I have a non-zero chance of winning hundreds of millions of dollars. That kind of money would be a life changer.

I know exactly what the risks and rewards are, and exactly how low the probabilities are of me winning any real money. I know that because every lotto drawing is an independent event, my odds don't go up by playing more than that.

If you never play, you never win. If you play just a little, there is a very small chance you might win a crap-ton of money. If you play a lot, you'll definitely pay a lot, and there is essentially that same very small chance you might win a crap-ton of money. One dollar every now and then for a shot at that much money is totally worth it to me. People that think they are actually going to win tend to pay $5 a week until they die, but their odds of winning are only a hair better than mine - those are the stupid people that make it worth my time to play one set of numbers every couple of years.

Your 'don't play at all' argument does apply to slot machines, though - payouts are too small, time invested is too large, and slot machines aren't actually any fun.

Re:What's next?

[vux984]

Ok ... so who is doing that? Name names please. Also explain why they weren't charged with first-degree murder like any other time a person knowingly and premeditatively causes the death of another. I dare you. Back your point up or admit you're full of shit. Pick one, coward.

Nobody did it with pintos.
The pintos were brought up as an analogy to the slot machine defects (the subject of this article). And in the slot machine article someone HAD gone around to hundreds of the defective machines deliberately to exploit the flaw.

So comparing fords liability with pintos to the casinos liability with the slot machines needs to also have a similiar actor deliberately exploiting the flaw for the analogy to work.

Re:What's next?

[KingAlanI]

you had some good comments, and I'll still be replying to you. it's cool. :)

Re:What's next?

[KingAlanI]

Approaching it mathematically adds entertainment value for me, even though most mathematically-inclined people avoid gambling.

I bought one ticket for that Mega Millions drawing (luck on one a la Charlie and the Chocolate factory); I played factors of 42 (3-6-7-14-21, 42); only the MegaBall hit. $2 sure ain't $millions, but I'll still take it. :)

I noticed that people were buying tickets on big-jackpot day like crazy; the question is if that would drive the expected value down enough to be a problem. Of course, in this regard, you have a chance with progessive jackpots that you don't have with pari-mutuel and/or fixed-payout prize structures.

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=site:irs.gov+gambling+winnings search results may be useful for USians

As for number-picking:
You might want to set up formal pooling arrangements in which you all play different numbers, and if under the arrangement you each end up entitled to part of the prize won on someone else's numbers, you've created a "higher chance at proportionally less money" situation without changing the rules of the game.

I focus on buying scratchoffs, so I haven't really thought about number-picking schemes. (In NY, the scratchoffs have a higher expected value to begin with, and concentrate the money in more-likely smaller prizes, which I prefer to unlikely bigger jackpots, all other things being equal.)

4 of the winning numbers in real life were those that Hurley played on Lost. I wonder how many Lost fans played his numbers for real? Could have skewed things bigtime if they had hit in RL for more than $150. That would be a weird category of number to avoid.

Re:What's next?

[Anonymous Coward]

How many times must I tell you to not split infinitives? That's going to really make me go nuts I tells ya.

Re:What's next?

[harlows_monkeys]

Actually, lotto is occasionally in your favor, due to rollover. If no one wins, the prize is added to the next week's prize. That does tend to cause more people to buy tickets, but the ticket sales don't go up as much as the prize, so occasionally it crosses over, and the expected return on a $1 ticket is more than $1.

There has been at least one case where an investment group tried to exploit this by buying up every possible combination, to guarantee a win. (Yes, there was a risk they would have to share the prize--they took that into account). In the case I'm thinking of, they failed to get all the tickets they wanted. They only covered about half of the possible combinations, but they still ended up winning, and came out with a very nice profit.

Curiously, the reason I know about this case is that it literally was a case. It was in the casebook for the course in transnational taxation I took in law school. That's because the lottery was in the US, and the investment group was from Australia (I may be misremembering the countries), and so it raised issues of which countries would tax the winnings and by how much.

Re:What's next?

[Chapter80]

My math was slightly off, as I focused on winning the jackpot, and forgot to factor in the smaller prizes (like your $2 prize) that occur at much higher probabilities. So this means that the last Mega Millions jackpot was even MORE in your favor than what I stated, as long as you made a smart bet.

Of course, your bet was smarter than mine. I bet $5, and lost on all of them. You hit the Mega Ball! Congrats.

I do remember reading an article where an organization tried to buy all numbers to the lotto, with an organized effort at multiple sales locations. It was back in 1992, and they succeeded.

Re:What's next?

[KingAlanI]

I recalled this example on an Irish 6/36 game; see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_National_Lottery#Games

Odds of winning jackpot 1/X, jackpot is Y dollars : that seems to be the pertinent information.
Are you saying that I should play (unlikely-to-be-shared numbers) when Y>X, or are you suggesting some other calculation based on these numbers?

In New York, the jackpot games available are:
state LOTTO (6/59) - 1 in 23 million
Mega Millions - 1 in 176 million
Powerball - 1 in 196 million

Re:What's next?

[Chapter80]

Odds of winning jackpot 1/X, jackpot is Y dollars : that seems to be the pertinent information.
Are you saying that I should play (unlikely-to-be-shared numbers) when Y>X, or are you suggesting some other calculation based on these numbers?

The simplified version is: I'm saying that it's mathematically a good bet to play (unlikely-to-be-shared numbers) when Y>X.

But that's really an overkill - a conservative position. When Y>X, it's REALLY a good bet. And the reason is because there are bunch of other ways to win besides winning the jackpot. Sure, they don't pay out as well, but they are winners.

Here's the math for Mega Millions, based on their probability chart (you can do this math for the other lotteries).

It's a "good bet", if the Jackpot is at least (approx) $143.7 Million (even though X is 175.7 Million). It's obviously a better bet if the Jackpot is greater than $175.7 Million.

I wrote a Python program to show you how this is calculated. First, I print the probability chart that you can see on the above web page. Then I figure out the minimum jackpot to make it worth your while.

Thanks for the challenge! Good way to keep my brain sharp on a Saturday morning.

match match prize chances
5 1 jackpot 1 in 175,711,536
5 0 $250,000 1 in 3904701
4 1 $10,000 1 in 689065
4 0 $150 1 in 15313
3 1 $150 1 in 13781
3 0 $7 1 in 306
2 1 $10 1 in 844
1 1 $3 1 in 141
0 1 $2 1 in 75
Odds of winning: 1 in 40

It's a good bet if you can buy a unique ticket,
and the jackpot is at least $143,732,416
>>>

from __future__ import division

def choose(pool, choice):
x=1
for p in range(pool, pool - choice, -1):
x = x * p
for p in range(1, choice + 1):
x = x / p
return x

win = ((56,5),(46,1))
combinations = choose(*win[0])* choose(*win[1])

win_chart = [
[5, 0, 250000],
[4, 1, 10000],
[4, 0, 150],
[3, 1, 150],
[3, 0, 7],
[2, 1, 10],
[1, 1, 3],
[0, 1, 2],
]

print "match match prize chances"
print " {} {} jackpot 1 in {:,}".format(win[0][1],win[1][1],
int(combinations))
winners = 1
payouts = 0
for w in win_chart:
winning_combos = (choose(win[0][0] - win[0][1], win[0][1]-w[0])
* choose(win[0][1],win[0][1]-w[0])
* choose(win[1][0] - win[1][1], win[1][1]-w[1])
* choose(win[1][1],win[1][1]-w[1])

Re:What's next?

[KingAlanI]

seems like you calculated the expected value of the jackpot plus the expected value of the other prizes.
I'm not much of a coder, so I've ran such calculations by hand (well, using Excel for layout and arithmetic)

It so happens that Python is the language I've used for what little coding I had done (my instructor liked how it's full-featured yet reasonably grokkable by beginners)

Is "from __future__ import division" the start of the actual code? Might I want to comment out (but still leave in) the text above that line?

Speaking for US federal taxes at least:
You're right about gambling losses being tax-deductible. However, you can't deduct more than you win, which somewhat increases the relative financial impact of losing, thus affecting the expected-value calculations (seemingly beyond the scope of this code)

It seems like the odds of having to split the jackpot would also be beyond the scope of this code.
Economically speaking, being neutral to risk and assuming proportional utility of money are some other non-code underlying assumptions.

Are you open-source-licensing this? :)

Re:What's next?

[KingAlanI]

Specific code written with Mega Millions in mind I see; similar math can be done for other lottery games (modularity goal here?)

Your math suggests betting with jackpot amount at 81.79% of jackpot odds; might a similar heuristic be usable for other games that have a similarly top-loaded prize pool? (I have noticed that the amount concentrated in higher-value less-likely prizes is an important part of lottery math even if the prize pools are of proportionally same size.)

Net present value of the jackpot annuity - financial-math calculation to be accounted for

Re:What's next?

[KingAlanI]

PowerBall jackpot at 34% of odds, NY LOTTO jackpot at 16%, MegaMillions at 11% - seems I've got awhile to wait for now. :(

Re:What's next?

[Chapter80]

Thanks for reviewing the code. After I posted it, I realized that I should have tossed in a comment or two. Sorry about that!

I'll try to answer your three responses in one post here.

First, the code that I posted (which showed up in the courier font) was 2 things. The top part was the program output, and the second part was the program listing.

You are correct in saying that the first line of the program is "from __future__ import division". (FYI, one of Python's biggest faults, in my opinion, is integer division. This fault has been fixed in Python 3, but I think most installations are on version 2 (2.5, 2.6, 2.7...), and so you need the line "from __future__ import division" so that division works properly. It's the difference of 3/2 being equal to 1 vs. 1.5. I want math to be accurate (3/2 = 1.5), so I include that line.)

The next section (about 7 lines, starting with def choose...) is a function definition, calculating how many combinations you come up with, when you have a certain size pool that you choose from. For instance, if you choose 3 items from a pool of 5, that would be choose(5,3), and would return 10. There are 10 ways to choose 3 items from a group of 5 (if you don't care what order you choose them in). The math in this example is 5*4*3/3/2.

The next line, win=((56,5),(46,1)) , is the definition of Mega Millions. For Mega Millions, out of the numbers 1-56, you choose 5 numbers, and out of 1-46, you choose 1 number. You WIN if you get the 5 and 1 correct. So I called the field "win". Stupid name. This is the ONLY line you need to change, to adapt for other lotteries where you draw numbers from 2 pools.

The next line (combinations = ) calculates how many DIFFERENT lotto tickets are available.

The win chart is taken from the website. I use this for payouts. For example, 5,0,250000 means if you get 5 right (of the first draw) and 0 right (the mega ball), then you win $250,000.

Then there are a couple of print statements that should be self-explanatory. The 2nd one is a little long and wrapped. The "int(combinations)" should be part of the second print statement.

The program is designed to print out the payout and probability chart that appears on the Mega Millions site. I wanted to make sure my calculations matched their official calculations. They do.

As I am printing the chart, I calculate certain values for later use. And I initialize them prior to the loop. winners=1 and payouts=0 sets these two initial values. winners is tracking how many winning ticket combinations there are. I start it at 1, to account for the 1 combination that is a jackpot winner.

Payouts is an accumulation of all of the winning payouts for all of the possible winning ticket combinations. Since I don't know what the jackpot is, I set payouts to 0, ignoring for the moment that the jackpot will be part of the payout (I'll come back to this on the last line of the program).

Then I loop through for each line in the win_chart. I am calculating the odds by calculating how many ticket combinations meet the parameters to be considered a winner. For instance, in Mega Millions, there are 45 possible $250,000 tickets where you get 5 right but the Mega Ball wrong. So the first time through the loop, winning_combos gets set to 45.

So, of course, with 45 possible winning tickets out of 175 Million total combinations, the chance you win $250,000, is "1 in 175M/45."; 1 in the total number of possible combinations divided by 45. The line "chance = ..." performs that calculation.

Then I print that out.

Then I increment the number of winning combinations (on the line "winners +=..."). This accumulates the number of possible winning tickets (so that later I can say that the odds of winning something are 1 in 40).

The "payouts +=..." line accumulates how much gets paid out to all ticket winners, if each possible ticket combination is purchased once.

So, I know how much it costs to buy every

lots of news stories of winnings denied, too

[swschrad]

"oh, geez, I'm sorry, but the back-room monitor says the payout is disallowed, the machine is wrong. please come with us and we'll count the money we need back."

happens often enough. there is a reason the casinos are palaces and the players live in single-wides.

Re:lots of news stories of winnings denied, too

[TheRaven64]

It can backfire, however. Gambling is heavily regulated and one of the requirements in some places is that the thing being gambled on must be random. These regulations exist to prevent casinos from having fixed decks for card games or rigged wheels for roulette, but they carry over to other forms of gambling. If you can show that their machine is deterministic, then they may be in trouble. A software glitch that lets you always win may well count, depending on your jurisdiction...

Re:lots of news stories of winnings denied, too

[Anonymous Coward]

One of the requirements in some places is that the thing being gambled on must be random.

This may be true for some places, but I don't know any of those places. Typically, slot machines are mandated to have a minimum payout, and are very configurable. Living in Vegas, I see casinos advertising their settings all the time: "We payout 98% on slots!!!" Also, once the computer has decided whether this particular spin is a win or a loss, the machine is free to game the displayed result in very sneaky ways. For instance, a loss may show as three bananas and one pineapple (just below the banana). It's a "near miss" that encourages the victim to try again. The next spin can display three pineapples and a banana. The results on the screen are completely manipulated, just as long as the win/loss ratio is within regulations.

And if you actually keep a verifiable record of the win/loss ratio, and can prove that a machine does not conform to the minimum, the casino can claim it is a software glitch and escape legal consequences. Of course, if they keep a record of you (and they do), and the win/loss ratio is not exactly what they set it to be, you get prosecuted.

Re:lots of news stories of winnings denied, too

[Lehk228]

if the house is winning on a "software glitch" they can expect the gaming commission to come in "testicles ou"t and commence teabagging

Re:lots of news stories of winnings denied, too

[Phoobarnvaz]

It can backfire, however. Gambling is heavily regulated and one of the requirements in some places is that the thing being gambled on must be random.

The only flaw in this is that they've shown the random number generator on motherboards aren't. Some former techs for the slot machine companies got caught milking the odds by about 3% on machines they had built because the RNG wasn't. Three percent doesn't sound like much...but they lost their job and any future employment in any gaming industry for "cheating" the casinos out of the three percent they thought was theirs.

Another one which isn't technically illegal (the casinos will escort you off the property the first time and worse after this) is counting cards. It's probability and puts the odds more in your favor...but will still get you 86'ed. See the movie "21" or the documentary of the students at MIT which did this to get an idea.

Re:lots of news stories of winnings denied, too

[oh_my_080980980]

Why?

This is a far cry from a player coming in with a device intent on cheating the game.

Through the normal use of the machine, players found a system where they can win. It's up the the casino to check their machines. How many instances are there where a machine should have paid out but didn't?

And $430k is a pittance for a casino. They weren't raking in millions.

Re:lots of news stories of winnings denied, too

[anegg]

Actually, I think you have it backwards according to news stores I have read about casinos getting back incorrect payouts. The "slot machines" (really "video lottery terminals") are completely deterministic over some period. Breakdowns in the pre-determined payout rate are considered to be a malfunction in the machine, which voids the payout. The government monitors of the casinos enforce this rule. The lack of determinism is only over a very small number of play actions...

Don't they have to prove intent?

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't the government have to prove intent to defraud? Maybe the guy thought he found a system to beat machines at slots, not defraud anything. What's next? People arrested for rolling casino dice in non-random way?

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[borcharc]

Our society has long ago dispatched with the concept of mens rea (guilty mind/criminal intent). With federal charges, he will likely never see trial. His assets are likely already frozen so he can't hire an attorney, so he is stuck with the federal defender who have a backroom deal to get you to plea out or let you sit in federal detention until you get the plead guilty today and you go home next week offer, after a year or so.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[TheRaven64]

People get their winnings denied for counting cards. I don't really understand how that's allowed - not only is it impossible to prove, it also seems like it means that the rules prohibit playing to the best of your ability.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[Anonymous Coward]

You will already be ejected for rolling the dice funny. The first time you do it you might get by with just a stern correction from the dealer, but if you look like you should know better or if you've already been warned, you will definitely be cut off. Come back after being ejected and you might very well be explaining it to police, and/or a judge.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[fishbowl]

>Doesn't the government have to prove intent to defraud?

RTFA. If the government can prove that the defendant knew about the exploit, then they only need to show that he persuaded the casino technician to change the settings so that the exploit would be active. Intent isn't difficult at all; the hard part is proving that the defendant knew what he was doing, which won't be that hard considering he did the same thing in different casinos.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[Anonymous Coward]

People get their winnings denied for counting cards. I don't really understand how that's allowed - not only is it impossible to prove, it also seems like it means that the rules prohibit playing to the best of your ability.

They get to keep your money instead of having to pay it out. They "prove it" by showing that you wager statistical significantly higher when the odds are in your favour and the only way of knowing that is by counting cards. So it's more a matter of correlation. But what are you going to do (as in you and what army-of-lawyers)?

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[Monkeedude1212]

Casinos make a lot of money that can go into taxes or pay a lot of higher ups to keep the government out of placing any real rules on how a Casino must operate.

So as it is, the Casino gets to decide the payouts, whats legal for gambling and whats illegal inside their own house. House rules, you know how it goes.

So yeah, it's not allowed because the Casinos don't want it to be allowed. All a Casino has to do to keep you from getting your winnings is claim you cheated, and the Law will pretty much turn a blind eye. Of course, a Casino doesn't want to do that to everyone who wins, otherwise no one would visit the Casino.

So they crack down on the people who KNOW how to win.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[geekoid]

I did casino security in the 80s. I could never find in actual evidence of that happening. In fact we had a notice from the gaming board that counting card is NOT illegal.

They can refuse business to anywhere.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[LetterRip]

People get their winnings denied for counting cards. I don't really understand how that's allowed - not only is it impossible to prove, it also seems like it means that the rules prohibit playing to the best of your ability.

AFAIK you cannot be denied your winnings for counting cards. They can however refuse to let you play if they believe you are a successful card counter. (They actually like card counting since most people make errors frequently enough that the edge from the counting is lost).

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[cayenne8]

"People get their winnings denied for counting cards. I don't really understand how that's allowed - not only is it impossible to prove, it also seems like it means that the rules prohibit playing to the best of your ability."

Actually, that is not true. If you are NOT using any mechanical or eletronic aids in counting cards, and are doing 100% mentally, then it is perfectly legal. In Vegas, they can for any reason refuse to let you play any further, but your money is YOUR money till they ask you to leave. If I recall, in Atlantic City, you can't be asked to leave if counting cards, but they will begin to start to shuffle between each hand which takes away the possible advantage the counter might have.

But there is nothing illegal about counting cards as long as it is only human effort. It is not illegal in any state in the US that allows gambling legally.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[Archangel Michael]

People do not get denied winnings for counting cards. They get denied access to the premises where they were caught counting cards. They do, however, get to keep their winnings. Counting cards is not illegal. Getting caught is unwise as your name is quickly passed to all casinos, and you don't have much change of ever going to one ever again.

Count cards all you want, just don't get caught.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[Intrepid imaginaut]

The rules prohibit anything that might make casinos unprofitable, thats why there are still casinos. Its all a big scam really, keep your money in your pocket and spend it on something worthwhile.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[chaboud]

This is just wrong. You don't lose your winnings for counting cards. You get bounced, keep your winnings, and that's it.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[John Meacham]

Casinos don't care about counting cards nowadays. Look in the gift shop of casinos in vegas, they sell booklets and "cheat sheets" on how to count cards right there at the counter with standard (not subtly flawed or anything) techniques. I think they realized that a lot more people _think_ they can count cards effectively than actually are effective at it so it is a net win. People bet more, not realizing the multi-deck combined with lots of booze pretty much ruins their chance at counting cards to their advantage.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[h4rr4r]

Which is properly called playing the game to the best of your abilities.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[Anonymous Coward]

I did casino security in the '00s, at a shitstain called "Cache Creek". Frog-marching people out the door for card counting was a nightly event.

That, and keeping people's kids off the game floor.

"Anonymous Coward" for a REASON ;)

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[anegg]

Winnings for counting cards are not denied in "legitimate" casinos (is that an oxymoron?). Card counting is legal, but once you are known to be capable of playing the game this well against the casino, the casino will refuse to let you play.

Try reading the books about the MIT student card counting teams here http://www.amazon.com/Bringing-Down-House-Students-Millions/dp/0743225708.

Or the Wikipedia article talking about the whole phenomena, here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_Blackjack_Team.

Re:Don't they have to prove intent?

[mythosaz]

Incorrect.

In nearly all jurisdictions, casinos can ask you to stop playing. "You've had a good run sir. Please no longer play here." ...but if they accept the wager, they pay you out on your wins.

In some jurisdictions, they've ruled that they have to allow equal access to the game to all players, or not offer it to you at all. In those cases, the casinos allow you to play...slowly...with a constantly shuffled deck...at low limits...or other countermeasures to make beating the game for a small edge (which is all counters have) unattractive.

http://www.indy.com/posts/casino-takes-card-counting-case-to-indiana-supreme-court

This is different from the slot case we see here, which isn't about betting and getting (or not getting) paid, but is instead about exploiting software glitches to record wins.

So if it's an exploit...

[Duradin]

"and if you find an error that you can exploit, you may find yourself facing Federal charges for doing so"

If it's an exploit maybe you shouldn't be doing it.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[pete-classic]

Aren't casinos exploiting humans? Isn't this worse?

-Peter

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[TheRaven64]

How do you define 'exploit'? People playing slot machines often try to see patterns. If a particular sequence lets them win once, they may try it again. If it lets them win every time they play it, then they'll keep using it. How are they supposed to know that the sequence lets them win because of a software error, rather than because of a particular intended behaviour? Or, for that matter, that it always lets the player win, rather than just happening to let them win when they try it because of a coincidence in the state of the machine?

As he said, he just pressed the buttons on the front of the machine. If someone puts up a game machine that pay you money if you hit the buttons in a certain sequence, is it illegal to press the buttons in that sequence? Or is it only illegal to press them in that sequence after a certain number of times?

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Surt]

The casinos are helping evolve our race against addictability. In the long run it will be impossible for a Casino to operate profitably, and that will be a good thing for humanity.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[H0p313ss]

"and if you find an error that you can exploit, you may find yourself facing Federal charges for doing so"

If it's an exploit maybe you shouldn't be doing it.

Particularly an exploit against an industry with historic ties to the mob.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[amicusNYCL]

The casinos are helping evolve our race against addictability.

Doesn't that sort of assume that the people who are addicted to gambling aren't reproducing? In order for that trait to be naturally selected against, there has to be a relationship between having the trait and not being able to reproduce. If you think that being a gambler means not reproducing, have you seen the prostitution industry in Vegas? How do you think people are paying for those prostitutes?

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[blair1q]

And humans are exploiting casinos, to the point where gaming companies' profitability isn't anything like impressive. That makes it fair.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow you didn't read the article did you? And you got modded up to Insightful. Slashdot has gone to hell.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Surt]

The gambling addiction need only provide a very slight reproductive disadvantage. Over time that will mean that people without that genetic makeup will dominate. Obviously, if it were sufficiently severe the effect would be much more immediate, but you have to think about what will happen to our race over the next million years if you want evolution to do its magic.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[chaboud]

I don't think so, man. What happens in Vegas... shows up roughly nine months later.

The stupid and addicted are way ahead of us...

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[owlstead]

I don't think gambling is a big issue for mankind the first couple of thousands of years, if we have that many. I would also like to point out the ever growing population, which will happily grow around those invulnerable to gambling. That and taking gambles might be very advantageous in life, although probably not in casino's. Your case is rambling like a bad slot machine.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Surt]

Barring the universe turning out to work in a way that violates the laws of thermodynamics, our ever growing population is not going to keep doing that indefinitely.

Your point about it being advantageous could absolutely be true ... it could definitely be the case that our genes can't differentiate between stupid gambles and wise gambles, and we're just stuck with the good along with the bad. But maybe not. I certainly know people who take risks but manage to resist the allure of the casino.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[kaiser423]

I'd love to see the statistics on people whom gamble in Casino's versus procreation rates. I'm willing to be that the correlation would show the opposite of what you're implying.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Surt]

Well, just remember that it's not just short term rates that matter. Your offspring have to be successful too. But you could be right. Personally, I suspect it would be a long term harm. Eventually someone is going to gamble away too much and they won't be able to keep their offspring fed.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[DoninIN]

1: Duh.
2: The whole notion of gambling is basically an exploit of the defective software that many people seem to be carrying in their brain. Maybe wecan start a class action lawsuit on behalf of all those who've lost their life's savings in casinos?

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Phoobarnvaz]

Aren't casinos exploiting humans? Isn't this worse?

That's why I got out of it after several years. Cheating stupid people isn't game...just means easy prey.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[ikkonoishi]

You assume of course that gambling reduces your chance to breed. That may not be true.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Eivind]

Certainly. I relentlessly enter into risks when the odds are on my side. I do it as often as I can, with the single exception that I don't do it when I can't afford to lose.

I buy stock. I cut insurance on both of our cars. I love. I refuse insurance and "extended warranties". I trust. I buy vacations early and get significant discounts.

All of which carries risk. The stock could go bankrupt. I could crash the cars. I could be betrayed. I could drop the mobile phone and break it. I could be taken advantage of. I could be prevented from traveling and lose part of the vacation-cost.

But, and that's the key. All of these gambles have the odds stacked in my favor. Insurance, for example, isn't charity, thus it always costs -more- than it's mathematically speaking worth. If there's 1% chance the company must pay you $50K, they'll charge you 2% of $50K for the insurance. Stock, generally speaking, over time tend to outperform inflation. Love is betrayed regularily, but people who don't dare to love, still overall tend to be the loosers.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Anonymous Coward]

Aren't casinos exploiting humans? Isn't this worse?

Last time I checked, people go into casinos of their own free will.

Re:So if it's an exploit...

[Surt]

Not just to breed, but the long term success of your line to breed. I strongly suspect that somewhere down the line you wind up with descendants who gamble away their ability to feed their dependents.

But it could turn out to be an advantage in some mysterious way. People with this particular vulnerability could have some oddly connected advantage in some other domain.

Idiotic Summary

[donutello]

The lesson here seems to be that casinos can deny you a slot machine win any time they wish by claiming software errors

This idiotic assertion does not seem to be supported by the facts of the case.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[ninja59]

Mod Up parent, I don't think the poster RTA

Re:Idiotic Summary

[Desler]

I don't think the poster RTA

Duh? That's the slashdot way.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[ninja59]

good call, point to you

Re:Idiotic Summary

[Mike Van Pelt]

This particular guy in Pennsylvania sounds like a crook -- but some of the other links look much more questionable. The Ontario one, in particular, looks like a flat-out "Casino just decides not to pay out" incident.

When you're dealing with casinos, in general, you're hardly dealing with paragons of virtue.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[tlhIngan]

The lesson here seems to be that casinos can deny you a slot machine win any time they wish by claiming software errors

This idiotic assertion does not seem to be supported by the facts of the case.

It's not an idiotic assertion in that it's true in general (all casinos have a clause like "payouts only after verification"), but it is a bit of a non-sequitor.

Basically, anytime the slot machine gives the jackpot, that machine is usually immediately taken offline and wheeled back for verification of the win. Of course, you're not allowed to see this, you only hope they're doing things like comparing the software against the government-escrowed copy (yes, the government maintains a copy of the software) and verifying the settings. Networked jackpots often have to confirm with the network operators in making sure the server actually sent the "win" command to the slot (networked jackpots are determined by the central server when you pull). At any point the casino can simply turn around and say "sorry, it was a glitch" and deny your jackpot. It's happened before.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[Tootech]

So why balme the Player? Blame the maker of the software for the slot machine and the casino's IT staff for not keeping their machines up to snuff.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[Anonymous Coward]

Ahh, but it does happen. A slot machine with physical reels instead of a video slot can show a win but its internal computer thinks you didn't win. Tie goes to the house. I've seen slot machines increment a reel after they've all stopped, forcing a not-win. Good times, that.

I surmise that the slot machines, or at least progressive (and networked) slot machines, are deterministic to a point. The House knows about when the jackpot will be paid out and where. They're not totally random, and they do want to not pay off several huge jackpots in a short span of time.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[Samalie]

I surmise that the slot machines, or at least progressive (and networked) slot machines, are deterministic to a point. The House knows about when the jackpot will be paid out and where. They're not totally random, and they do want to not pay off several huge jackpots in a short span of time.

Nope, not the case, because that WOULD be illegal. Every single roll of the random number generator must legally be "random" (or as pseudo-random as random number generators are capable of getting), which basically means every spin has to have the exact same 1 in whatever chance of hitting the jackpot.

The "joy" of these progressive machines though is simply...the house always wins, even if they had a sudden rash of wins in a short period of time, because the jackpot re-seeds at some arbitrairly low-ish number, not at the same amount as was just paid out. The permutations and house edge % programmed into the payout tables for the RNG take care of generating re-seed money.

Basically, the algorithms are all in place, and all this is stitistically accounted for. The principle of gambling is that in the short term, every game/slot machine/etc has a chance of you hitting a jackpot, and/or winning some money, over losing. In a small number of trials, any statistically improbable event can happen. In the long term (millions and millians of trials) the house takes anywhere from 1 to 20% per trial.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[BLAG-blast]

Nope, not the case, because that WOULD be illegal. Every single roll of the random number generator must legally be "random" (or as pseudo-random as random number generators are capable of getting), which basically means every spin has to have the exact same 1 in whatever chance of hitting the jackpot.

The numbers would have been randomly generated, but they would have been generated far enough in advance that the house knows when it's going to happen. So you are betting on the out come on an event that has happened, rather than one that will happen. And you as you point out, the house could re-seed or adjust the current payout ratio to suit the situation (re-adjusting it later to conform to the required payout law, or not).

Re:Idiotic Summary

[flowwolf]

How is this modded informative? I'm looking for evidence that this is an idiotic lesson to be learned, but I cannot find anything about it. Uninformed. YIHRTFA.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm... they don't know exactly when, but they have a good idea. They know how the RNG was salted, unless they're using a truly random chaotic RNG, like meteorite backscatter, radioactive decay rates, etc.

A networked prog slot game isn't going to pay off the Big Prize right after they put it in service, as that kind of defeats the point of a prog slot (increasing jackpot garners more and more interest) for the casino. But the game can't run forever without paying out the big jackpot, either, because people will eventually start going Meh. And they're not going to have a way-out remote machine (remote = not in a casino or McCarran) give out the Big Prize, either. It's random, but not totally random... If they DID know more precisely, they could just put certain machines out of service until they know that the winning combination isn't going to come up for awhile longer.

a $100K min "big prize" jackpot on a prog nickle slot machine, well, that's a LOT of nickels to suck in, even if you're pulling them in at 5 per pull...

The joy for the House for slots is that they always win, and they will win over the long haul, until people get tired of playing it. They just have to maintain a certain flux of people playing the slot machines.

And, the odds for a non-prog slot machine popping out large jackpots in a small cluster is gonna be...0. They'll notice and pull the machine if it is individually having its own streak of "bad luck", and then repurpose (put new guts in it) or reprogram it so it doesn't happen again to that machine.

The operators can't control exactly when a big payoff happens, as that IS illegal. But they're gonna have a reasonable idea when and where it will happen. It maybe a game of chance for you or me, but the casinos don't leave it all to chance.

McDonald's isn't supposed to know exactly where and when the Park Place sticker is gonna show up, but they have some idea where it's been stuck, so they can be on the lookout for potential fraud or cheating. It would be bad press for them if that sticker didn't show up in a game. They already got burned by one set of operatives who were responsible for putting the cups, etc. with high-value price pieces on them into their "random" locations, but were instead more or less giving them to friends and family for some kickback. They know enough so that they have some control, but not enough for someone to claim it's completely fixed, disclaimers and other legalese in the game not withstanding...

Re:Idiotic Summary

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, compliance agents from the casino and the government verify large wins (they don't have enough manpower to verify every single low value win), and they do compare the software on the slot machine with the software approved for that jurisdiction.

You're wrong about networked jackpots however. The random number generator (RNG) in the slot determines the win. That's by law. The server only monitors the incrementation of the shared jackpot (usually a portion of the money taken into each slot machine in the link), and handles displaying the grand prize. The server does NOT tell any given slot machine when it's time to win.

Every slot (at least in the US) has a disclaimer on it that says "malfunction voids all pays and plays"; which means basically if the game does malfunction, it voids the game in play at the time, even if the play resulted in a win.

And casinos, legitimate ones at least, do not arbitrarily deny honest wins to players. To do so would result in potentially huge fines by the government. They could even lose their gaming license and be forced to close. Legalized gambling in the US and Canada is one of the most heavily regulated industries there is. More so than many banks or mortgage firms.

Re:Idiotic Summary

[Peter Simpson]

FTFA: he and his associates talked casino employees into enabling normally disabled features, which allowed him to exploit a software bug. Doesn't sound much like "I was only pushing buttons" to me.

So, to be clear...

[amRadioHed]

casinos exploiting human failings to make millions and millions of dollars is legal. People exploiting casino failings to make millions and millions of dollars is illegal.

Re:So, to be clear...

[Dalzhim]

Can't be more simply put. It is so true. Wish I had mod points.

Re:So, to be clear...

[fishbowl]

In this case, convincing a technician to change the settings on a slot machine so that you can exploit a flaw, is criminal fraud.
It would be different if the defendant didn't have such an active, intentional role in having the machines altered.

Re:So, to be clear...

[BondGamer]

If you brought in billions in revenue to the state, you too could have special laws enacted for your benefit.

Re:So, to be clear...

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

casinos exploiting human failings to make millions and millions of dollars is legal. People exploiting casino failings to make millions and millions of dollars is illegal.

Notice what people do in casinos is called gambling?

Re:So, to be clear...

[Evil_Ether]

It comes down to one thing, tax. The casinos winnings are taxable not the players.

Re:So, to be clear...

[PatPending]

It was a democratic vote of the people that made gambling legal in their state so don't blame casinos for following a law passed by their citizens.

States collect sinfully large sums of money from taxing alcohol, tobacco, and yes, gambling. Nevada for instance has no personal income tax (partly) due to taxes from gaming. Are you proposing we outlaw these things? Well, people are gonna drink, smoke, and gamble anyway! (Prohibition was a failure. And how's "The War On Drugs" coming along?)

And who are these casinos? Many are public corporations owned by stockholders, including unions and pension funds. BTW: some of the greatest benefactors from legalized gaming are Indian tribes.

Re:So, to be clear...

[amRadioHed]

As opposed to what the casinos do?

Re:So, to be clear...

[TheCarp]

> BTW: some of the greatest benefactors from legalized gaming are Indian tribes.

That sounds like a pretty racist thing to consider.

> States collect sinfully large sums of money from taxing alcohol, tobacco, and yes, gambling.

Given that all of these things are addictive, you could say that the state is, in fact, profiteering off the individuals whose choices leave them, often, in position to afford it the least. Gives new meaning to "sin tax".

> Well, people are gonna drink, smoke, and gamble anyway! (Prohibition was a failure. And how's "The War On Drugs"
> coming along?)

I certainly know that I prefer my drinking, drugging, and gambling with a slight hint of the danger of being robbed or stabbed, and I LOVE paying the premium required to get other people to take the risks of providing me these indulgences. If only they would prohibit alcohol again, so I could risk blindness on imitation hooch! Now THAT is a good time!

> And who are these casinos? Many are public corporations owned by stockholders, including unions and pension funds.

Very very true. So essentially, by betting on black, you are saving for retirement! Almost makes me wanna head to vegas now. Though, I don't think they have any shortage of takers on that bet.

-Steve

Re:So, to be clear...

[IdolizingStewie]

Players' winnings aren't taxable? Only if you have enough losses to cancel them out. Guess I'll just throw out that 1099 if I ever win over $600. Even if you don't win over $600, your winnings are still taxable, you just don't get a 1099 to help you remember. I will be reporting the $4.25 I was up at the tables last year.

Re:So, to be clear...

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

As opposed to what the casinos do?

That'd be business, so yes, quite opposed.

Re:So, to be clear...

[blair1q]

Ever seen the "special laws" imposed on casinos? Very few of them help the casino at all.

Without them, the casinos would probably still be run by the mob, who would be only too happy to tell you "no payout" regardless of the reliability of the machine.

And if the mob still ran the casinos, these guys would probably be in a hole in Pahrump instead of a federal court.

Re:So, to be clear...

[schwit1]

Nobody is forcing people to gamble. What he did was akin to insider trading.

Re:So, to be clear...

[PatPending]

by betting on black

"That sounds like a pretty racist thing to consider."--Ha!

Learn the diff between racial and racist.

Re:So, to be clear...

[Anonymous Coward]

well duh, off course one has to pay taxes of what is won, although I guess one does not play billions in tax for a price in millions :P

Re:So, to be clear...

[Anonymous Coward]

Was that supposed to be a counter-point? Seems to me more like a tautology.

Re:So, to be clear...

[Geminii]

Obviously the Pennsylvania guy got caught too soon, then. :)

Remember, kiddies, if you're making millions by being smarter than the guy next to you, remember to buy a couple of politicians with some of that cash!

Re:So, to be clear...

[chaboud]

Just a little note, but your gambling winnings are, in fact, taxable. There are special sections of forms and special forms on your taxes for proceeds from gambling.

I see a fair solution to this

[Anonymous Coward]

If the gambler wins, the house voids the play. If the house wins, the player voids it.

As for criminal charges - this is one of those extremely rare cases that screams "jury nullification" from the get-go.

job vacancy for large Pokie company...

[mug funky]

i read a job app a few years ago for the dominant "pokie machine" developer in my state. reading the requirements was a bit of an insight into the sort of thing these people do:

- high level mathematical modelling
- statistical analysis
- ability to develop for a statewide networked system ...the house always wins indeed. spread enough bell curves around enough machines and they'll all seem exactly within an arbitrary margin of error while overall they're heavily stacked.

i hope this poor bastard wins his case.

Never works in the little guy's favor

[ackthpt]

When I hit a jackpot in Las Vegas the machine didn't pay out. When I complained about it they said they didn't have any (Ha!) control over it not paying out, must have not tripped something in there, even though I should have been bathed in cash.

Totally fair

[eedlee]

Casinos can change the odds at will, banks can defraud depositors, and brokerages can make millions per microsecond trading phantom ticks. But don't you dare win at slots bitch!

Re:Totally fair

[geekoid]

"Casinos can change the odds at will,"

no, they can't.

The more money you have...

[Anonymous Coward]

...the more you can bend the law to exploit others. The trick is getting enough money to do this without getting destroyed in the process by people that already had a lot of money.

Re:The more money you have...

[Anonymous Coward]

Bend the law?!?

No, no, no, no.

"The Golden Rule: He who has the gold makes the rules."

--Robert Kiyosaki.

You see, we the (little) people, have to live by the rules of the rich and powerful. Sure, we get a bone thrown to us every once in a while, but it's a fake bone. Health Care reform? fucking Insurance companies loaded the deck. Credit Card reforms? Please. the banks loaded the deck so all they have to do is give you a little more notice before they raise your rates to 30% and they have to get your bills to you a little earlier - but they're free to treat you the way they treated you before.

the law is perfectly fair to the powerful.

We, on the other hand, get fucked.

Re:The more money you have...

[larry bagina]

That quote didn't originate with Robert Kiyosaki. He's the Dan Brown of financial advice.

Insider information

[Dan East]

To distill the article, those machines have some software options, such as volume, screen brightness, and some game options, such as whether or not a Double-Up feature was enabled.

Somehow the guy knew that if the Double-Up feature was enabled a software flaw would be exposed, whereby a certain sequence of button presses would trigger a jackpot (and the jackpot would not be recorded in the data log).

The machines did not have Double-Up enabled by default, so this guy would ask casino techs to mess with settings, like the volume and brightness. While they were changing those settings he also asked to have the Double-Up enabled, thus "enabling" the bug.

So the glaring question is how did this guy know about the "correct sequence of buttons" and the fact that it specifically had to be enabled via the Double-Up feature? To me this reeks of a developer slipping in a "glitch" to trigger a jackpot at will, and it was hidden with that Double-Up feature which they knew was disabled by default to keep the sequence from accidentally being discovered (or found via auditing).

The real criminal is the insider that passed this info along, and presumably maintained anonymity and safety while his patsy actually went around and harvested the winnings, which I'm sure the software developer would receive a share of.

Re:Insider information

[emanem]

A bit like the other bigger casinos which hold all our money...if you know what I mean!
Really sad,
Cheers,

Re:Insider information

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you've cracked the case! Solid detective work there sir!

Re:Insider information

[hierophanta]

tin foil hats for everyone!!

Re:Insider information

[Chyeld]

As a youth, I used to play an old game called Sundog on my Atari ST. It was a space faring/trading game where part of your objective was to buy/steal/find the resources a new religious colony demanded.

One of the things I discovered were a series of glitches in the game that allowed me to skip the heavy trading of the game and make good money buying and selling 'inventory' items instead.

From memory, a bug in the shopkeeper interactions allowed me to buy the second item in the inventory for the price of the first item. In weapon stores, the first item was always a cheap healing dodad, while the second item was always a fairly hefty priced force shield.

So it started off with me getting cheap 'armor'. On top of this the shields had a set number of hits on them, and the 'glitched' copies, being uninitialized, effectively got an extra 'hit' out of them as the first hit set their 'remaining charges' to the max amount.

At first I used that and the fact that you could carry more than one shield to 'hunt' muggers in the streets, if you wandered around you could get 'lucky' and suddenly find yourself surrounded by a group of people demanding your cash. If you choose to fight and survived, you could loot them for their cash and weapons and then go sell those on the black market in the nearest burger joint. It was 'OK' money, but I then discovered a way to make it even faster.

You see, whenever I attempted to sell one of the 'uninitialized' shields I could never get more than the cost of those cheap health items. And while they sold at 'full' value when once they were initialized, each hit after that first one reduced their value. BUT what I discovered on accident was that you could SHOW the person you were selling to a fully charged 'legit' shield and once you and they were finished on haggling the price, you could give them any shield, regardless of it's remaining charges.

Weapon costs varied planet from planet, so what I'd do is fly to the cheapest planet I could find and fill my ship with 'knockoff' shields, then head for the most expensive planet and reap 100-200% profits.

My point is, I wasn't more than 12 when I found this out, on my own. There wasn't an internet back then, not for the public at least. This sort of glitch doesn't require insider knowledge, just someone with an idea of how these machines work and a willingness/ability to experiment on them.

Of course, that doesn't always pan out. I loved Sundog but the thing I remember most about it was that the novella/backstory for it indicated that the whole reason I was doing all this was to clear my dead uncles debts and even indicated specifically how much I owed. The final stage of the game involved an extremely well hidden city on a planet that was only reachable once you purchased top of the line parts for your ship. When I got stumped on that stage (because I didn't even know there WAS a city to find) I decided the final part of the game must be collecting that sum so I could officially pay off his debts. I'm sure you can imagine my frustration when a year later, after having collected what I think was over five times the amount, I finally bumped into the hidden city while exploring and finished the game in less than 10 min after that.

Re:Insider information

[TheCarp]

I would guess thats likely... but not a foregone conclusion.

An accidental glitch could hide the same way. Its down a lesser used code path, so nobody found it. Its entirely possible that one of these guys, or someone else entirely, got his hands on a machine (maybe even stole one... possibly from a maintenance place....), found the glitch, and then concocted a plan to use it?

That doesn't even rule out it being an intentional glitch, he may have found the (or one of several) glitches that someone else added and is using more discretely, or is one "in the bag" to use after a different one.

Generally, yes, most plausible explanation is that it started as an inside job. However, it doesn't have to be, and even if it was, its not necessarily clear that he was in on that plan, could be an independent discovery. ...or who knows... maybe the developer's guy got really drunk in a bar one night and shot off his mouth to some stranger about how it worked.... he may still be out there, discretely hitting smaller jackpots.

Re:Insider information

[Bemopolis]

Yes, but did you find a way to exploit the in-game slot machines? I need money to get to Icebox.

Re:Insider information

[Chyeld]

Hehe nope, never did. They were my bane too, since after I found the 'developer' easter egg where you'd be approached by one of the programmers and given $200,000 if you said you liked the game I was convinced that there were other hidden items and that getting the jackpot would result in something 'awesome'.

Re:Insider information

[Anonymous Coward]

Alternate Possibility:

If the 'Double-Up' feature is disabled by default, which means it will not often get used (ie: tested) then there quite possibly was a software bug.

Triggering the bug:

By playing the game, enable 'Double-Up', then possibly changing another option like brightness, then go back and disable double up before actually spinning the slot machine. Repeat this process until you hit a jackpot.

Explanation:

Let's say the code logic has several copies of the same structure/variables holding the values for the machine 'options' (poor coding). If the process doesn't actually disable the 'double-up' boolean (software bug) in the structure/variable which is used in the payout logic, but does update it in the structure/variable that controls the GUI display and the variable which is recorded in the slot machine's database.... BAM exploitable software bug, and hard to test for because you'd have to run through this specific combination enough times to actually hit a payout, and then look at the actual payout vs recorded payout to find.

I'm not saying what you're suggesting isn't possible, but given the information about the quality of code in other posts here I think this scenario is more likely.

Re:Insider information

[Anonymous Coward]

Cool story bro

Re:Insider information

[socsoc]

That you Steve? You didn't sign your post, so I'm unsure.

Re:Insider information

[Anonymous Coward]

Two references to Sundog in one day. Wow. Here, this is for you. You guys should connect.

http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1939704&cid=34787576

Re:Insider information

[Anonymous Coward]

Sort of like Baldur's Gate. Don't remember if it was a potion or scroll, but you could buy it to boost your thieving skills to 255%. Then you could steal unlimited items from the shopkeepers (who never ran out) and immediately sell them back to the very same shops. Free money.

Re:Insider information

[19061969]

Sounds a bit like an old game I used to play on the BBC Micro at school called UK PLC. You played Prime Minister and determined tax rates, expenditure and tried to defend against an increasingly dissatisfied population.

The trick was for the first three years to set the income & corporation tax rate to 10000% or some other stupid figure and expenditures to negative figures, reap loads of cash and survive the hate and then in the last 2 terms of power, give a lot of the cash back with zero tax and massive expenditure. Cheating, yes, but the game company *should* have put bounds checking in.

Re:Insider information

[TheCarp]

at least that time I didn't double sign it. Heh old habbits may not always die hard, but they don't die quickly.

Re:Insider information

[Zebedeu]

I remember playing a game called The Koshan Conspiracy. It was similar to what you describe. You could meet people on the streets and ask questions, barter for their items, steal or fight.

As you'd try to steal their items, people would get progressively more pissed off. However, if you gave them something, they'd revert to a happy place, so you could try stealing again.

The funny part was that you could actually play with their inventory like it was your own. Eventually we discovered that we could start by giving them a large backpack, stuff all of their stuff into it, and then try to steal the backpack with all the items at once.

Then we started to run into another problem: our character we had limited space for items, but we discovered that items inside a backpack didn't count towards the character's available space. Furthermore, a backpack would take the same space whether it was full or empty.
So we started to stuff full backpacks inside empty ones. At one point we had a full hierarchy of backpacks with items organized by type: guns, ammo, food, drinks, etc.

It was a fun game. Never managed to finish it though. The story component was always a bit too complicated to follow, and it was the kind of game where a wrong turn could make you lose the whole game without you even knowing it.

Re:Insider information

[oh_my_080980980]

Yeah all $430k. Seriously, I doubt someone programmed this...it just as easy could have been found out.

I suppose the lesson is do not make adjustments after the fact. Setup separate high roller machines and monitor them. Which is what the casino is suppose to be doing in the first place.

Re:Insider information

[anegg]

If you haven't seen this already, take a look at this article http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=11/01/07/023215 and search for a post by bfwebster, or just search for sundog.

What are the odds?

Re:Insider information

[Chyeld]

Yes, it gives me warm fuzzies to know that one of the primary programmers for the game is a /.er

Though I was a bit sad when I read up and found out that Sundog was the reason he quit programming for four years after he finished it, due to burnout.

Sundog was back when I had only ever had a handful of games as staples to play, and most of them were FTL games.

Audit the Casinos

[tsnorquist]

So can gamblers audit the casinos to ensure all the times they lost were not due to a "glitch"?

Re:Audit the Casinos

[blair1q]

You already do. It's called the Gaming Commission. One of their jobs is auditing casino games of all kinds, both in test and live situations.

Re:Audit the Casinos

[Anonymous Coward]

So can gamblers audit the casinos to ensure all the times they lost were not due to a "glitch"?

Of course not.

Re:Audit the Casinos

[kaiser423]

That's the function of the gambling regulatory commission, a government agency, so yes.

I'm definitely not siding with the casino's here, but there are checks in place. Too bad it doesn't seem like they ever check anything...

Re:Audit the Casinos

[Anonymous Coward]

So can gamblers audit the casinos to ensure all the times they lost were not due to a "glitch"?

You call the gaming commission and yes they will conduct an audit.

Re:Audit the Casinos

[oh_my_080980980]

EXACTLY!

Are you kidding me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Boy, this slashdot posting really has misrepresented the actual article. This isn't some guy that accidentally won a couple of big amounts because of a software glitch. This is a guy that knew about the glitch and then went out of his way to use it in multiple casinos in order to win lots of money. He even had to talk employees into effectively "turning on" the glitch. Very bad for slashdot to post this the way it was.

Re:Are you kidding me?

[Anonymous Coward]

Boy, isn't he a criminal.

Kinda like my tax lawyer, who knows a few glitches (aka loopholes) in the tax code and helps me save hundreds of thousands every year.

He had even talked to tax collectors at one time to make them see his way of filing my taxes, effectively having them "turn on" the loophole.

He went out of his way to use the tax returns of all his customers to perpetrate this fraud and win them lots of money.

Very bad this thing is possible at all, he should go to jail.

Re:Are you kidding me?

[owlstead]

And you conclude this from the article? I think that the article is idiotically biased, not Slashdot. Notice also how they even enlist the help of his former friends to go out of the way of making him an example. If there is anything evil going on, it is the state and casino's conspiring against one of their citizens. Even if he's guilty of anything, their behavior is way worse than his.

Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[PatPending]

I'm looking at a slot machine right now and I see this notice: "MALFUNCTION VOIDS ALL PLAYS AND PAYS". Period. It doesn't matter whether that malfunction happens internally or externally.

Gaming is heavily regulated by a state gaming control board and the slots machines themselves have incredibly robust state machines (including power-hit tolerance), tamper resistance, history logs (games played; events; system errors; etc.), and must be certified by a state gaming control board (and possibly a third party lab such as GLI).

Disputes naturally arise and there is a state gaming board approved method for dealing with them. If the player is still unsatisfied he is free to seek a civil action in a court of law.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[hierophanta]

malfunction = you winning. problem?

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

I fail to see how this works.

If I put a sign up that says you get payed $50 if you pull a leaver, I expect to be paid $50 when I pull the leaver.

If I put a sign up that says you get payed $50 if you pull a leaver and light flashes, I expect to be paid $50 when I pull the leaver and the light flashes. It doesn't matter as to the chance of winning, but the fact it was triggered.

So long as the machine is not actively tampered with, I won fair and square. I followed their rules; they should too. If the machine malfunctions, why is that the customers fault? Surely that should be the fault of the casino - they should buy good machines and maintain them properly. Bad software and hardware glitches should be their problem - much like groceries that have been scanned at the wrong price.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Coward Anonymous]

How do you prove money was taken from you as a result of a malfunction?
You can't. That notice is weaselese for "We won't pay out if we don't feel like".

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[sabt-pestnu]

The minimum cost of prosecuting (or perhaps, defending) a civil action may well determine a payout denial threshold. If it costs too much to prosecute, why pay the sucker? Claim it was a malfunction, get the gaming board to agree.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

My sole question is would the player get his bet back once the error is discovered? Or further could you statistically calculate how much you should win and demand that back? Claiming that you didn't receive it because of errors in the machine. Never mind, I forgot why people gamble in the first place.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[PatPending]

How do you prove money was taken from you as a result of a malfunction?

You don't; you don't have to because the machine knows what money came in, when it came in, how it came in, along with everything else that transpired prior to the malfunction. It's all recorded and available for playback to a state gaming control officer. You have to realize that these are incredibly robust machines, meticulously regulated by a state gaming control board, and meticulously certified (such that the manufacturer has to provide full disclosure of schematics; mechanical drawings, and source code).

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[TFAFalcon]

When was the last time a casino refunded people when they found a machine was malfunctioning? If it's a defective machine, they should refund all people who used it since it's last maintnance.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

I forgot why people gamble in the first place.

I've noticed a lot of older gals ("seasoned citizens") playing slots--it's very much a social activity for them, like bingo is in some states.

But why go to a bingo hall (usually in a church) when you can gamble, get free drinks, smoke, and partake of the "All You Can Eat Buffet" for $1.99 instead? (And maybe "get lucky," too!)

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[blair1q]

Yup. If the machine was borked you're free to sue for your bets back.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

Believe it or not, the simple fact is: (legitimate) slot payouts--and the bigger they are, the better--are fantastic publicity news for a casino. At such an event the casino makes sure the winner gets their photo taken holding a 2.5'x6' sized check so it can be published for publicity purposes. Casinos have learned that this draws even more people to their venue(s)! Conversely, bad news turns people away, so it's not in a casino's (shareholder's) self-interest to behave as you describe.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Big Smirk]

The problem is, they apparently didn't win by the definition of 'win'. Only the machine looked like it won. The machine never even logged the fact that someone got a payout.

Seems like these clowns found a way to make the machine flash its lights - unclear if they even had to pull the lever.

They machines list the payout... something like 4 'whatevers' in a row, and you get the jackpot. The machine doesn't say "If the lights flash, you get the jackpot".

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[kaiser423]

Doesn't sound like a software malfunction. It did exactly what it was coded to do. No Gamma Ray came in and flipped a bit. Nothing malfunctioned. Sounds like their audit and certification sucked. Maybe they should get better at it and write this off as a lesson learned?

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see how this is a malfunction. Bad design is not a malfunction.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Lehk228]

because if the casino does that often enough they risk a) the gaming commission, b) bad press, and c) an unstable victim of such fraud walking in the front door with an ak 47 killing everyone in sight, which is REALLY bad for business.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

How does full disclosure help if they can declare it a malfunction when the machine faithfully executes the certified code? What's the reference frame for something being a "malfunction"? Is there a formal specification of how the machine should function?

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm looking at a slot machine right now and I see this notice: "MALFUNCTION VOIDS ALL PLAYS AND PAYS". Period. It doesn't matter whether that malfunction happens internally or externally.

Yeah...unless that means they will track down every single person who played and lost to return their money in case of a malfunction, it doesn't seem like malfunction voids all plays. It seems to void them only when the house is on the losing side. That is hardly fair, and the law should recognize that.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Skidborg]

So if the machines are so good... why did this one have an exploitable glitch?

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[PatPending]

I don't what is going to happen in this case. My opinion is: I think the casinos will demand the manufacturer of the slot machine compensate them for their losses, and I also think the manufacturer will do so. Both the manufacturer and state's Gaming Control Boards will adjust their internal processes and procedures accordingly.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[PatPending]

I dunno; human error? Conspiracy? Exploit in one of the development tools? (The investigation is on-going.)

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[PatPending]

This particular "malfunction" is the exception, not the rule, because this one went undetected by the gaming machine. When a machine normally malfunctions, it enters a tilt state, prohibiting any money in/money out/game play/etc. until such time as an operator resets the machine. (After examining the error message and following the prescribed procedure, etc.)

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Coward Anonymous]

I think this event, as well as many others, have shown these are distinctly not "incredibly robust machines".
And all your certification, regulation and record keeping doesn't change the fact that if a "gamer" on the casino floor demands a refund because the machine malfunctioned he will be initially laughed at, then forcefully ejected from the premises and possibly arrested.
Malfunctions are the casino industry's "pre-existing condition"- always at the ready to weasel out of an inconvenient expense.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[TFAFalcon]

But they only find out about the malfunction when they check out the machine. And since the machine is now determined to be defective, why they should be forced to assume that it was defective since it's last checkup. So the law should require them to review their video archives and refund every single person that used it in that period (finding them should be their expense).
Then they could either check their machines more often (making it easier to dispute their 'error' claim in court), or just pay out the jackpot.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

If the player is still unsatisfied he is free to seek a civil action in a court of law.

He may win a pair of concrete boots

Badoom! I'm here all week, try the veal.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[pak9rabid]

This is a standard disclaimer on all automated casino games. I used to work for a company that produced automated gaming machines for casinos and every one of our machines had this stamped on the front of it. It also got tested in court on a regular basis by dipshits who would lose all their money, they get pissed off and sue the casino. These people rarely (if ever) won these lawsuits.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[anegg]

Perhaps you could review other postings to this thread, where folks who actually worked for some slot machine companies commented on the "robustness" of the machines and the code development process. I would like to know if those posters were talking out of their butts or not.

My personal view is that you have an over-idealized concept of state regulation and how well it works, especially when there are very large amounts of money at stake for both the casino owner and the state. With the state and the casino owner being essentially partners in the endeavor, as it were.

I would be happy with a few citations of instances where the casinos refunded all of the money taken from players for all of the plays prior to a "malfunctioning" machine indicating a jackpot that is not paid due to the malfunction. Ideally, this refund cycle should go all the way back to when the machine was last known to be working properly.

Re:Malfunction voids all plays and pays

[Anonymous Coward]

Having worked for a gaming machine company as a technical tester for several years, which included dealing with external test labs and regulators, I can see where all this is coming from.

In theory, at least, there is an effective system for finding problems. In some cases, the machines will go through 3 sets of QA before getting finally approved for actual use (manufacturer / test lab/ jurisdiction). It's not just black box stuff either, the test labs get source code, and they will do things like run diffs against previous versions to check that what the manufacturer said they changed is what they actually changed.

In practice, like anything, it's fairly hard to find _all_ the bugs. Plus you're dealing with an area where there's scope to insert deliberate bugs/backdoors for profit. Was this the case in the original story? Possibly .. it sounds like he could have had an insider, it seems like a fairly obscure set of triggers to find by "chance"

I think the other problem is there seems to be a permanent sense of "rushing around" to get things out the door and ready, and quality suffers. Manufacturers push on the test labs to get things signed off faster, and quality can suffer as a result. And yes, sometimes version control, good software development practices etc went a bit "by the wayside" as things got tough. Particularly around trade show time, as everyone wants to have their new shiny products approved and ready for sale.

Not just a s/w error

[PPH]

According to TFA:

The men persuaded casino technicians to alter "soft" options on the machines, such as volume and screen brightness controls.

It appears that their scheme went far beyond exploiting a s/w error in a 'deniable' fashion (Anyone could have pushed that combination of buttons by chance) when they had technicians reconfigure the machines.

IANAL, but one problem in obtaining any sort of criminal conviction is that of proving intent. Had the button combination been pushed with nothing else going on, there could have been some question. But once they solicited help from the casino techs, the jig was up.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[fiannaFailMan]

He could argue that he liked that level of brightness and volume, something that is not uncommon among high rollers according to TFA.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[Pollardito]

He should have quoted more of the story, because it wasn't brightness or volume that was the issue:

The pair, according to police, had knowledge of a software glitch in one of the high-bet slot machines. In order to expose the glitch, a special "double-up" feature had to be internally activated. The men persuaded casino technicians to alter "soft" options on the machines, such as volume and screen brightness controls. Such perks aren't unusual for high-rollers, who can wager anywhere from a few hundred to thousands of dollars in one day.

One Meadows employee, who was not criminally charged or accused of wrongdoing, agreed to enable the double-up feature on the machine with the glitch.

Normally, such a feature would allow a player to risk doubling his winnings or potentially losing them all. The double-up feature isn't usually enabled on the machines in part because it's unpopular with most gamblers, who are unwilling to risk large amounts of money.

Read the story and you'll see that there's a lot more to it then just his preferences. For instance he was using a third-party to cash in winnings that he knew would raise eyebrows.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[RobYoung]

He could argue that he liked that level of brightness and volume, something that is not uncommon among high rollers according to TFA.

He was asking to have a disabled gambling feature (double down) activated, not merely adjusting the brightness and volume.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[Anonymous Coward]

IANAL, but one problem in obtaining any sort of criminal conviction is that of proving intent. Had the button combination been pushed with nothing else going on, there could have been some question.

Mmm, not really. Sounds like you're off on a frolic in "faulty-logic" land.

If the defendants had knowledge that a certain combination of buttons would alter the machine's functionality to their advantage it would still satisfy intent for purposes of gaming fraud: they pushed the buttons with the intent to defraud. Even if the machine was already in its altered state (say the found the machine with the settings already altered) the fact that they were aware of the glitch and acted on that awareness to defraud still satisfies.

I think you're trying to suggest an evidentiary problem (i.e., without the record of the technician linking the men to the alterations, there's no evidence of the intent). This too is false. It's quite possible to use indirect evidence to establish the defendants' awareness of the glitch, and therefore intent (access to the code or devices, friend at the manufacturer, whatever gave them awareness of the glitch).

Considering this appears to be "part of a much bigger scheme" (according to TFA), I'd say their defense team might have their hands full trying to keep these guys out of federal bang-you-in-the-ass-prison.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[kaiser423]

This does add another layer, but I'm still not too sure.

I mean, so he got some technicians to enable a feature that is disabled because most gamblers do not like it.

Then he won enough and had someone else cash it out because he knew that it would raise eyebrows. That just seems like an intelligent move.

The casino's got to audit the code, so did the gaming commission. Maybe they should have better audits rather than rubber stamps? Because it sounds like some guy did a better audit than them and used it to gain an edge usually reserved for the house.

Now if he planted the bug, or paid someone to or whatever, then there's crime here. But otherwise, I'm not seeing it.....

Groups track roulette tables religiously in order to find ones that have an players edge if certain numbers are played, and that is legal. Casino's swap the tables overnight retire popular ones, conceal, etc. In this case, the casino's jsut need to audit the code a bit better.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[h4rr4r]

So he asked for and was given a couple adjustments to the machine, what is the problem?

Had the casino not liked his request they could have denied it.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[h4rr4r]

One that was only turned off since some folks did not like it. Besides he asked, he did not use force at any point. The casinos could have refused to do it.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[h4rr4r]

No, they found a set of buttons that could improve their odds. All gamblers strive for ways to improve their odds. Finding a way to play a game that improves your odds is not fraud, tampering with the machine or using slugs instead of coins is fraud. The house made a bet and now wants out of it.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[jedidiah]

You're dealing with people that will accuse you of being a cheat or blacklist you for no other reason than being too successful.

Of course they used a mule.

The fact that they could dupe the staff into triggering the bug is interesting. Dunno if I buy into the "innocent employee" routine though.

Although there are effective enough ways at getting at the truth there.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[L4t3r4lu5]

They didn't dupe staff into triggering the bug. The bug was always there; The staff merely activated an unpopular (yet completely legal by law and gaming commission rules) feature which allowed you to "double-up" for the chance at a double jackpot, or bust. The exploit is independent of this feature; Exploiting it once the double-up feature was active just allowed a higher return.

Re:Not just a s/w error

[Anonymous Coward]

The casino's got to audit the code, so did the gaming commission.
[...]
Casino's swap the tables overnight retire popular ones, conceal, etc. In this case, the casino's jsut need to audit the code a bit better.

In this case, you just need to audit your plurals a bit better.

They cheated

[Anonymous Coward]

While we can all claim that the casinos are wrong here, the perps cheated. It doesn't matter if the game's code is flawed, taking advantage of that flaw is cheating. Keeping the games as fair as the law allows is all the casinos have to do. There's no recourse for the gamblers.

That's not a bug

[iceaxe]

That's not a bug, it's an easter egg.

Casinos exploit humans

[Anonymous Coward]

> Aren't casinos exploiting humans? Isn't this worse?

They pay their State taxes; they're fine Corporo-citizens.

Gambling devices must be transparent

[davidwr]

Any gambling device that isn't well-understood by the gambler isn't a true game of chance.

I trust a roulette wheel because the laws of physics in the casino are well-enough understood that I trust the laws of physics to produce a random outcome that is statistically predictable over the long run. This means either open-source and open-blueprint systems or systems that have had LOTS of independent eyeballs examine the code under a "limited NDA" which protects the designer while encouraging the reporting of faulty designs or implementations.

For electronic devices I have to be able to trust the random number generator AND all non-random elements of the machine. I also have to trust that cosmic rays hitting a chip and other non-designed-in elements of the machine influence the outcome either in a statistically predictable way or their influence is so small that both the house and the gambler are willing to either accept the outcome in the face of cosmic rays or are willing to trust an independent third party to void the bet when a cosmic ray interaction is detected.

Few if any proprietary gambling systems meet this criteria.

Games You Can't Win.

[goodmanj]

I like seeing stories like this. Maybe if we have enough of 'em, people will realize that gambling when the house has a stake is a sucker's game.

There's an anecdote in the book "Games You Can't Lose" by Harry Anderson (who played the judge in Night Court, and is a longtime stage magician and collector of cons and swindles). To paraphrase:

One day on a whim, this guy places a bet at a sidewalk Three Card Monte game and of course he loses. So he starts watching carefully how the game is played. And he notices how the dealer ignores bets that are placed on the right card when someone else bets on the wrong one, and how a Monte game always has a bunch of shills around who will helpfully make the wrong bet in case none of the marks do.

So the guy comes back the next day, and when the dealer calls for bets, the guy pulls out a staple gun and staples his dollar to the Queen. Bam! The first guy to ever win at Three Card Monte.

And he pocketed his winnings, after the nurse at the emergency room un-stapled them from his forehead.

It should be:

[mellestad]

Casino owners arrested for exploited known bug in human brain.

As my dad would say...

[fiannaFailMan]

... go into a bookmakers and there's four windows for paying in but only one window for paying out.

Not about him winning

[jjohnson]

In order to expose the glitch, a special "double-up" feature had to be internally activated. The men persuaded casino technicians to alter "soft" options on the machines, such as volume and screen brightness controls. Such perks aren't unusual for high-rollers

This wasn't about hitting buttons, they were using social engineering to enable a flaw that became exploitable. This is no different than screwing someone at a cash register by confusing them on the amount of change they're supposed to give you, an age-old grift.

Re:Not about him winning

[TheCarp]

Ahahahah I saw some dude trying that one time...and he was so bad at it... but... the clerk looked like he was so stoned, that he didn't know how to respond.

He kept trying to tell the clerk that he gave him a 20, and should get 10 more back, the clerk was pretty sure thats not true, but, was kinda dumbfounded. Eventually the guy tried "how about you give me a pack of smokes and we call it even".

-Steve

Re:Not about him winning

[jjohnson]

An awkward grift is an awesome thing to behold.

Every time I worked a cash register, I was taught to put the money given to me by the customer on top of cash drawer, keeping it separate from the cash, until change had been given, just to avoid this. "No, you didn't give me a twenty, you gave me this ten right here."

Re:Not about him winning

[TheCarp]

Actually, I gave a grifter $10 once.... even though I knew he was a grifter.

He had come up to me with a clipboard trying to raise money for some charity. I spotted it immediately as a grift but... he was so good at it. I mean, he was really spot on, I actually enjoyed watching him work.

I handed him the $10 spot with a smile and moved on, my friend turned to me and said "You know that was a scam right" and I said "Yah I know, but that guy is slick, he puts on a good show, it was worth it."

Had kind of a similar feeling after one that I lived with moved out. I mean, he rightfully took me for about 3k in back rent, phone charges, and probably a few hundred more in drinks and other things (he sure "got me back later" all right)

When we caught him...oops, don't think he planned on his ex-roomate having my friends number and wanting my friend to get his shit out of her basement... thats when we found out he had been scamming them (landlord lived upstairs, they found over a years worth of bank notices, apparently he had been bouncing checks to the landlord and stealing the bounce notices from the mail).

Anyway... when we ran him out of town (well out of the apartment), and thats when the true magnitude started to come into focus. Within a week the owner of the bar we drank at came around asking about him... and the $3k advance they gave him to do their website!

Then the $900 phone bill (in my name) came in...

Turns out everyone had something about him that they noticed was off but dismissed. Even I had suspected that the whole "I spent summers in france with my family growing up" was a lie. He would always ask what time it was in french. It must have been all he knew because one day I looked at my watch and belted the time back to him in french, and I could tell he had no idea what I just said (even though he nodded yes, after asking me to repeat myself 3 times... :) )

Anyway yea, great guy at a party though.

Re:double standard - or...wikileaks?

[Anonymous Coward]

if only there were a web site somewhere on the Internet to release information on criminal behavior....

Card Counters cannot be denied their winnings

[gurnec]

This is a common misconception which the likes of Vegas and Atlantic City would love everyone to continue to believe. There are no jurisdictions in the United States in which card counting (without the use of any devices) is illegal. Additionally, a casino has no right to take back any winnings which were legally obtained. In Nevada, casinos *are* permitted to deny you entrance or ask you to leave if they suspect you may be a card counter. AFAIK, they are also free to share ban lists with other casinos as they see fit. In New Jersey, casinos are not even allowed to go this far. Players may not be denied entrance simply because they are too skilled (see Uston v. Resorts International Hotel, Inc.).

Re:Card Counters cannot be denied their winnings

[Lehk228]

most of the time the casino doesn't even care if you count cards all night, don't do it at really high stakes games and don't do it alone. as long as you are there making the table look "hot" to other players, you can count cards and get comped free drinks for reeling in the suckers for the house.

Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[perpenso]

I suppose the most glaring issue here is the double standard that software errors can be legally taken advantage of by the casinos, while they are illegal to take advantage of by the gambler. (or at least that looks like how the recent verdicts have been swinging)

I understand your sentiment but technically the casino is only taking advantage if they keep the bet. If the play is void due to a *genuine* software error and the bet is returned then both sides have been restored to their initial state and no one has been taken advantage of. I understand the psychological let down (trauma ?) of seeing a win flash on the screen only to be told that the play is void but I don't think that counts as taking advantage of the gambler in a technical sense. Of course I am assuming that software errors only generate false wins and that legitimate wins are not somehow lost.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[www.sorehands.com]

Well, no. I question if their claims of software errors causing payouts is always legit. Not in the case of this guy, but in cases of other people who actually win.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[perpenso]

I question if their claims of software errors causing payouts is always legit. Not in the case of this guy, but in cases of other people who actually win.

I understand, that's why I qualified my statement with *genuine* software error and legitimate wins not being *somehow lost*. In this particular case, if the bug had been immediately recognized, the play voided and the bet returned I'm not sure the casino could be faulted.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[mug funky]

source or GTFO, huh? :)

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[chaboud]

Sorry, man, but a software "error" is a pretty vague term. The code is written, tested, and audited. It's not rocket surgery here. Once a bet is engaged in, it should sit. You certainly won't see casinos nullifying bets if machines are under-paying gently.

We have gaming commissions to audit code and assure the legality of these systems. Both sides of the gambling puzzle, if honest, would want an empowered and effective auditing process. In reality, the house has tilted both the auditing process and the legal system in their favor.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[h4rr4r]

I would find fault with it. They should at the very least have to compensate the player for his wasted time. If you let me play a game of chance and then claim that I only won via your own mistakes either I should get to keep my winnings or at least be compensated for the lost time.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[laughingcoyote]

Most casinos have a rule that blackjack dealers cannot hit above 17. But if the dealer does hit on a hand totalling 18 anyway, and loses, they owe me the amount of money I won, not just my bet back. They can subsequently fire the dealer, if they want, but their screwup is not my problem, nor should I be denied a win based upon "Oops, we didn't mean for it to work that way...".

The scenario doesn't change because the "dealer" making the error is a machine. They can take the machine right out of service, and I imagine they would, but I was still shown a win and am owed winnings, not my bet back.

One would think they would pay a sufficient amount of money for code auditing to ensure that these things cannot happen. If they fail to do so, fallout from that is their problem, not mine.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[perpenso]

I don't think blackjack is a very good analogy since the payout is quite limited compared to the hypothetical big slot machine win. I expect that the rules for a remedy vary with the game.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[Ghengis Khak]

Most casinos have a rule that blackjack dealers cannot hit above 17. But if the dealer does hit on a hand totalling 18 anyway, and loses, they owe me the amount of money I won, not just my bet back. They can subsequently fire the dealer, if they want, but their screwup is not my problem, nor should I be denied a win based upon "Oops, we didn't mean for it to work that way...".

The scenario doesn't change because the "dealer" making the error is a machine. They can take the machine right out of service, and I imagine they would, but I was still shown a win and am owed winnings, not my bet back.

I agree with all of this.

One would think they would pay a sufficient amount of money for code auditing to ensure that these things cannot happen. If they fail to do so, fallout from that is their problem, not mine.

And why would they do this when its cheaper just to buy legislation?

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[psithurism]

Well, you know how casino's call you up years later and tell you "Mr. Perpenso, we are so sorry, you would have won an enormous jackpot the other Day, but a technician had enabled some settings that caused a glitch that denied you that win. Here is the $7,000 you would have won that day." Oh wait, they don't do that. If gamblers are losing more money than expected, no one cares, gamblers just lose and have no right to return and demand re-dos. But if the gamblers win, then an investigation is held and casinos can come collect what they think was won by their own mistakes.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[anegg]

The casino will "keep the bet" if they are winning, but will cancel a payout if they can show it exceeded the pre-programmed win-loss ratio for the machine or was due in any way to a machine "malfunction." (They may refund the single bet that preceded the payout, but that doesn't count for much.)

This one: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/31/fortune-valley-casino-say_n_520182.html

This one: http://www.freeslotmachinescasino.com/news/jan07/pennyslots.html

and this one: http://www.inquisitr.com/46188/casino-denies-man-166m-jackpot-after-slot-malfunction/

The reasons for the payout cancelations vary, but no where is there any mention of the casino giving money back to all of the people who were betting and losing money on the malfunctioning machines prior to the "incorrect payout".... if the machine was broken the entire time, all bets should be canceled and the money returned, or else the payout should be allowed to stand.

If I were king, my rule would be that if the player is allowed to bet, the casino must pay out if the player wins, no matter what the cause of the win (except for fraud). Casinos might take a little more care in the acceptance of machines, promoting better development processes, etc. As long as they can simply cancel wins due to what they claim is a malfunction, while keeping all losses, there is no incentive to improve the state of function in the code that drives the machines.

I believe that gambling is fundamentally stupid, but if the state is going to allow it, the state should allow it on terms that are equally favorable to the plebes and the casinos.

Re:Technically only double standard if bet forfeit

[bws111]

This is incorrect. The casino does (and can) NOT cancel the payout because of win-loss ratios. How could they, it would require them to see into the future After all, if the machine has a 1/1,000,000 chance of paying a jackpot on each play there is just as much chance it will pay it the very first time it is played as the 1,000,000th time it is played.

None of the links provided say nothing about exceeding win-loss ratios. They say they were voided because the supposed winnings were greater than the amount the game was capable of paying. If you are playing a machine that has a top prize of $2500 (which they always display in BIG letters), you have no right to expect that a supposed win of $1M dollars is legitimate. Obviously a mistake has been made.

I once received a letter from my bank stating that because my mortgage was payed off they would be refunding my escrow account. I thought this was odd, because I was only 5 years into a 30 year mortgage. I called the bank and they said 'oops, we meant to send a letter saying that the LTV was less that 80%, so you didn't need to pay PMI any more'. Years later I asked a lawyer friend what would have happened if I stopped paying my mortgage because of that letter, and he told me the bank would insist on being payed, and if I attempted to use that letter of proof of not having to pay I could be charged with fraud, because I knew it was not true.

If you were paying a bill on-line and instead of 100.00 you typed 10000, would you just say 'oops, my bad, keep the extra 9900.00?' Or would you expect the payee to return the money to you?

only in Nevada

[YesIAmAScript]

And as far as I know, their winnings are not denied for counting cards.

Instead, the casino just bans you. In Nevada a casino can ban you for any (or no) reason. So if they think you are counting they just tell you your business isn't welcome here anymore. You get to cash out what you have but you must leave and not come back.

However, gambling to your best ability is not illegal, however using an assistive device is. You can be prosecuted and your money taken for using a computer to help you count cards.

In Atlantic City, it is not legal to ban you for arbitrary reasons, so the casinos take other anti-counting measures, most notably continuous shuffling machines. With these, literally any card not on the table at the moment could come up next (instead of those also in the used pile), so the odds what could come as the next card never change enough to take advantage of through counting.

I do not know the legality of assistive devices in Atlantic City, I suspect they are illegal there too.

Re:only in Nevada

[Lehk228]

let's not mince words, they are not assistive devices, they are cheating devices.

I remember the first time

[TheRecklessWanderer]

I still remember the first time I walked into a casino in Vegas.

The thing that shocked me the most was that there was a bank on the casino floor that would give out mortgages on the spot.

Does anybody really think that an organization that will take such horrendous measures to relieve you of your money is going to be concerned in the slightest that you don't get treated fairly?

Vegas has got to be the saddest place on earth.

Re:I remember the first time

[Master Moose]

.. . And here I was thinking that the pawn shops around our local gambling hole(s) Auckland were bad enough

Re:I remember the first time

[KingAlanI]

When passing through Vegas on a group outing (we were flying in and out of McCarran, and taking vans to our destination elsewhere), one of the more cynical adults in our crew pointed out a seedy pawnshop as a real face of Vegas.

No to mention the giant racks of slot machines we saw as soon as we got out at the gate

Reading more carefully

[Barefoot Monkey]

Reading more carefully, it looks that the man isn't being arrested for exploiting a glitch (having his winnings refused would have been a sufficient response for that); he was arrested for demonstrating specific knowledge about something that appears to be a carefully-concealed easter egg. That suggests very strongly that he is in fact party to fraud.

Re:Reading more carefully

[Wansu]

... he was arrested for demonstrating specific knowledge about something that appears to be a carefully-concealed easter egg. That suggests very strongly that he is in fact party to fraud.

Sure. He tried to beat these crooks at their own game but he was discovered. They don't want any competing crooks.

I suppose there are people who feel like they are being entertained when they patronize casinos but they are also supporting a racket. The gaming "industry" was mostly founded by the mob, then overrun by slightly less seedy corporate interests. But it still just scaled up grift.

Here's hoping they all die and bust hell wide open.

Wrong in so many ways

[nurb432]

Sure, he can be banned from the casino and be charged with trespassing if he returns but to be charged with a crime for using the software as the casino provided to its patrons is just wrong? Its their fault its not what they wanted, as he just played the game they offered to him.

I bet he will win the case in the end.

Casinos are just providing a service ...

[perpenso]

Aren't casinos exploiting humans? Isn't this worse?

They are not exploiting anyone, they are providing a service. For a fee they will play cards with you. :-)

MALFUNCTION VOIDS ALL PAYS AND PLAYS

[Anonymous Coward]

In the UK, all fruit machines have the legal text "MALFUNCTION VOIDS ALL PAYS AND PLAYS".
I have been writing software for fruit machines for over 5 years, i have yet to release a game that doesn't include a cocktail of known bugs, both hardware, and software. MANY including the way that random numbers are generated!
I

More like forgery than exploiting

[Anonymous Coward]

From the article, it seems like he caused the machines to display false jackpots, ones that didn't actually happen. Seems kind of like forging a winning lottery ticket to me. Yeah, modern systems have bar codes and IDs and can tell what's real and what's not, but just because a system doesn't, doesn't mean it's legal to rip them off.

Old Chinese Saying

[Anonymous Coward]

"Don't look for honesty in a thieves' den."

Harry Reid

[Vinegar Joe]

We thank you.

Reminds me of a This American Life Story

[bluehenbear]

Here's a summary: "Back in the 1980s Michael Larson made the most money ever on the game show Press Your Luck. And it was no accident--Larson had a plan to get rich that surprised everyone: The home viewers, the show's producers and mostly Larson himself." http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/412/million-dollar-idea

I would let them off light.

[Timmy D Programmer]

They need some sort of punishment, and pay restitution for it, but it's pretty dang hard to resist a temptation that big. Plus many people who loose big money at a casino THINK they have a system to beat the house. It just turns out these guys ACTUALLY DID. But the bottom line is they did do the wrong thing, even if the Casinos and Slot company sorta had it coming for being so negligent.

Re:I would let them off light.

[Lord Kano]

They need some sort of punishment, and pay restitution for it, but it's pretty dang hard to resist a temptation that big. Plus many people who loose big money at a casino THINK they have a system to beat the house. It just turns out these guys ACTUALLY DID.

But the bottom line is they did do the wrong thing, even if the Casinos and Slot company sorta had it coming for being so negligent.

What's wrong about it? If the machine has a flaw that they didn't put in it, there's nothing wrong with what they did. The Casino should be cited for filing false reports.

LK

*sigh*

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe if we have enough of 'em, people will realize that gambling when the house has a stake is a sucker's game.

Hate to break it to you, but the vast majority of casino patrons already knows the house takes more than it gives.

People go to casinos to have fun, believe it or not.

oh COME on!

[Anonymous Coward]

They're going to make gamblers too paranoid to use slot machines!! Having to face charges for a software "exploit" is crazy! So, if you're honestly playing the slots, not knowing about any glitch, but you happen to do the right thing in order to win money that you shouldn't have, you can go to a Fedaral prison??? The USA needs to make some changes to its laws ASAP. I certainly don't want to live in an irrational country! The proper thing to do is:

(1) let the gambler keep the money
(2) make him immune to criminal or legal prosecution
(3) FIX THE GLITCH so the casino doesn't lose more money!

The old IGT games are in mame now and double-up

[Joe The Dragon]

The old IGT games are in mame now and they have double-up.

also in the past you use to see lots of games with double-up trun on now days you do not is there some old code that is still in there but not used that much so bugs do not come up that much and not reported? is the old double-up code getting messed up by the new games that have 9-20+ lines and let you bet 1-5 coins per line?

Don't blame the player...

[houbou]

C'mon.. this is ridiculous. Software glitches... shouldn't be the player's problems. That should be the casino's problem and the supplier who sold the machine to the casino. As far as I'm concerned, the player may thought he found his "lucky" combo keys.. punches.. etc.. whatever it is. It's that simple. Don't expect a player to police fairness in a casino.. If all the player was doing his using the interface as intended, then the fault is the casino, not the player. There are no "sequences" which can be determined as cheating unless these were instructed. It's really that simple. It's gambling. And it's an automated system. Don't put it out there if it's defective. The rationale here could be the reverse. How many people, because the system has glitches, could have won, but never did. Casinos can be sore losers.. The players won their monies.. End of story. If there is a glitch.. Take the machines out, fix them and get over it. If I were the players I would sue the casinos for wasting their times. These casinos are designed to take your money. If they get to lose some.. tooo bad.. All part of the game.

Business as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

It's okay to steal from the poor (in fact, it's institutionalized). But don't you dare even THINK about stealing from the rich. Same way as it has always been.

Re:Business as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course stealing from the poor is OK. It's called quantitative easing.

Gambling should be illegal

[GodfatherofSoul]

All it does play on human frailty to suck money out of the lower- to middle-class. The worst is sports gambling where once the dollars get big enough bribing players becomes viable. With legalization, a shady character has enough money in the pot to finance throwing enough money at a player, ref, or coach to overcome morality barriers and entice millionaires. And, yes it can and does happen even in the biggest sports. You'll still have gambling if it's illegal, but because gambling/casinos requires such a large infrastructure to support, you limit the scope just by telling people they can't do it. Sure, Vinny and Tony are still going to run numbers in the back of the pub, but that's not like a $50 million dollar riverboat with doors wide open.

Oddly enough, I think we should legalize most drugs. Go figure. The difference in my mind is that people are going to do drugs illegal or not. We've seen that prohibition does a lot to slow down gambling, but not drugs.

onus on casino

[ldcroberts]

if it's deterministic the casino should be fined, losers should all be refunded, and winners should keep their winnings. i don't think it's hard for casino's to put penalty clauses in to their supplier agreements for machines etc, or to shuffle card decks more often to prevent counting etc.

Code Audit

[ThisIsNotMyHandel]

The casinos should be responsible for auditing the code in their machines before putting them on the casino floors. It is not the fault of the user for some error in code. Thank god we have Harry Reid to cover the casino's ass.

Counting cards is not illegal

[mrnick]

It can get you banned from casinos but the police couldn't care less. It's just that the casinos have the right to refuse service to anyone for any reason.

Re:Counting cards is not illegal

[ps2os2]

The Brits seem to think you are only partially wrong as if you don't give them the "key" you are guilty.

It's also not a secret and is even regulated

[Sycraft-fu]

You find that the odds are quite well known and gaming commissions watch over this kind of thing. In the case of something like say a Roulette table the odds are dictated by the setup of the game and so long as the equipment hasn't been messed with chance will keep things fair. In the case of computerized games, like slots, it is dictated percentages. Things like "A machine must pay out 90% of what it takes in," kind of thing. This is all checked up on, they make sure casinos are paying out what they are supposed to. It isn't a problem, of course, because the odds are in the favour of the house. However gaming commissions make sure that the house doesn't try to tilt them further than is legal or stated.

It is that way no matter what the game or setup, always the house has the advantage. Even if you take a game where the house doesn't participate directly. For example poker is nearly always players only, the dealer works for the house and doesn't play. So how's that work? Well the take part of the pot. Some of the chips are taken and dropped in a slot on the table by the dealer. The house gets their take, no matter who wins, for hosting the game.

None of that is a secret.

Of COURSE the house always wins

[Sycraft-fu]

Do you think they could be in business if not? If there was a way to reliably beat the house, it would be discovered, exploited, and casinos would go out of business. You cannot be in business if your business is losing money. Every game, all of them, have odds in favour of the house. The amount is not at all a secret. For old school, mechanical/manual games it is dictated by payouts vs odds. For example Roulette pays 1:1 for bets on black or red, meaning you double your money if it comes up your colour. However only numbers 1-36 have colour, 0 and 00 do not. So 5.3% of the time, a number will come up that neither a red nor black bet can win, hence the odds are against you. You find out when you evaluate payout rates that 5.3% is the house's advantage in all of Roulette. Any bet you make, those are the total odds against you. So betting a single number pays 35:1, but of course there are 36 numbers meaning that over the long run, you lose 5.3% of your money.

This is well understood, and well regulated. With electronic machines, they are simply told what their payout has to be. It is generally above 90%, often above 95%. That means if the machine takes in $1000, it is expected to pay out $900 or $950 or whatever. This is all monitored by the commission that oversees gambling in the state (or country). Again, none of this shit is secret.

If you really believed that there should be a way to reliably beat casinos, you are just deluding yourself. It isn't about skill, it is purely about luck, and the odds are stacked against you and that is KNOWN.

I think this probably ought to be illegal

[LrdDimwit]

As you say, the only question is whether exploiting this flaw is illegal. And I think it has to be illegal. This is very similar to the classic bar code alteration scam (wherein the crook goes to a store, swaps an expensive item's barcode for one that costs a lot less, then pays "normally" and hopes the cashier doesn't notice). The fraud, in this case, isn't exploiting the software error by itself, but rather, a combination of exploiting the error and claiming it's a legitimate win in order to induce the casino to give the man money he's not entitled to. He cheated at slots, by deliberately forging and then misrepresenting (as legit) the results of his play. This is ultimately no different than altering a lottery ticket or playing poker with a few aces up your sleeve.

That is the key fact that makes this a crime. If someone happened to be playing the machine, then unknowingly triggered this error, they might forfeit the (erroneous) winnings - which would suck - but they wouldn't be on the hook criminally. But this man allegedly knew the details of the bug, then deliberately set out to trigger it as much as possible.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[exomondo]

But he didn't alter anything, he just played it in such a way that a glitch occurred, the way in which he played it was perfectly legitimate.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[qeveren]

No, he used the interface provided by the device as designed. That the device is faulty is the casino's problem, not his. How did he forge anything at all?

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[smart_ass]

He cheated at slots, by deliberately forging and then misrepresenting (as legit) the results of his play. This is ultimately no different than altering a lottery ticket or playing poker with a few aces up your sleeve.

Misrepresenting ... yes

Forging ... no

He took advantage of a flaw in the software that caused the machine to print out an incorrect winning slip.

This would be more akin to using an automated lottery terminal where a special button combo guaranteed a winning ticket. This of of course wouldn't be possible since the numbers are't drawn until after the tickets are purchased ...

Would be more like being able to select your lotto numbers and then though a key combo have the terminal back-date the ticket so that it was for the previous draw. Note from the article though that the winning slip did not exist within their system .. so to continue your lotto analogy, ou would have to keep the winnings low enough that the store where you buy the ticket pays you out.

Where I am from anything over $500 (I think) has to be claimed at an official lotto office, where they would detect the issue.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[buybuydandavis]

If a company has a software bug that they know benefits them, do they all go to prison too?

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

No he didn't. He ASKED and then got what he wanted. He tricked nobody. They knew exactly what they were being asked. They simply were not aware of the bug. However he didn't trick them. He simply got a feature activated that is not normally activated. It could just as easily have been already. Knowing a bug exists an exploiting it to your advantage is no different then what the casinos do. With your logic it is just as easy to say that the casinos exploited the guests at the hotel because they are taking advantage of people's perceptions (which are intentionally advertised in such a way to suggest) that they can come out winners when in reality it is tipped against them.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[LrdDimwit]

"As designed?" We're clearly dicussing an exploit. Nobody designs slot machines and deliberately inserts autowin codes. He used the device "as is" in a way that clearly violated the anticipated design of the machine.

What makes it a forgery is this: The machine claimed he won. He did, in fact, not win. He forced the machine to incorrectly indicate that the casino owed him money. This is not exactly a "written" instrument, but it's close enough: The machine's "you have won!" display functions equivalently to a document purporting to entitle him to a large amount of cash. But it was not produced as a result of a legitimate game of chance, which is what the machine is supposed to do. Instead it was produced as a result of deliberately triggering a malfunction, which was then misrepresented as legitimate.

When he claimed the jackpot, he presented the printout, the winning screen on the slot machine, whatever as proof that he had won the game of chance. Playing the slots at the casino is effectively entering into a contract with the casino: Play this game of chance according to the rules, and if you win, we will pay you according to the reward schedule. He didn't play according to the rules, instead, he misused casino property to made it appear as if he had. As I see it, that definitely falls under 'the fraudulent making and alteration of a writing to the prejudice of another man's right.'

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Isaac Remuant]

It's a complicated issue but it seems that he deliberately changed (by asking an employee) the setup to exploit a specific software bug.

What happens if it was an ATM and it kept giving you money which wasn't really on your bank account each time you pressed a specific combination.

Are you entitled to that money because you did nothing wrong? Is the bank entitled to charge you for a mistake they made?

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

"As designed?" We're clearly dicussing an exploit. Nobody designs slot machines and deliberately inserts autowin codes.

Dude. The people who design slot machines deliberately insert code that generates wins and loses according to a specific schedule. Clue: the operators can adjust the percentage payout!

When he claimed the jackpot, he presented the printout, the winning screen on the slot machine, whatever as proof that he had won the game of chance.

Lol. These machines are in no way games of "chance".

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[cgenman]

My university might provide a keyboard and mouse, but it would be illegal to use that to hack into the university mainframe. It's like going to an ATM that you know is broken, and withdrawing all of the money from it.

And maybe once would be more understandable. But using other people to cash out the winnings so as not to draw attention to himself? Asking technicians to enable the feature that allowed him to win? That's definitely exploiting a software error to extract money. How would that be different than, say, exploiting a flaw in how PayPal handles transfers in order to get unlimited credit in your account?

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[AmiMoJo]

Slot machines are not a legitimate game of chance though. If you examine the disassembled code you can see that supposedly random outcomes are actually decided by the code to keep the player feeling like they might win.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[HungryHobo]

I'm leaning against the guy in TFA yet I still percieve what you wrote as desperate reaching.

People who build roulette wheels intend for them to be truely random(or biased in the casinos favor), if someone then after watching thousands of spins works out that the wheel is flawed and certain numbers come up more often than pure chance would indicate have they clearly violated the anticipated design of the machine? no, they've played the game that was put in front of it and they used their brains.

The wheel claims they win, (I could throw in a "He they did, in fact, not win" but that would be simply false like what you wrote) if I wanted to distort the issue I could say that they manipulated the situation to make sure the wheel displayed the "you have won" state also known as the ball landing on the number they had bet on equivalently to a document purporting to entitle them to a large amount of cash.
But it was not produced as a result of a legitimate game of chance, which is what the machine is supposed to do. Instead it was produced as a result of deliberately placing bets on numbers more likely to come up.

when something involves electronics it doesn't magically change everything, roulette wheel or slot machine.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Magada]

I'd mod you informative if i had points. That being said, this little fact has always amazed me. It seems the casinos could be easily taken to court for fraudulent advertising.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Noughmad]

If it benefits them, it's not a bug. It's a feature.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[tehcyder]

I'm shocked, shocked to find that.deception is going on here.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[tehcyder]

What happens if it was an ATM and it kept giving you money which wasn't really on your bank account each time you pressed a specific combination.

I thought everybody knew that secret combination. For those who don't, simply email me your card and PIN number and I'll get right back to you...

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[garyj4]

Nope, they did not use the interface as intended. They requested the interface be modified with 'soft' changes, then exploited the soft changes.

"The pair, according to police, had knowledge of a software glitch in one of the high-bet slot machines. In order to expose the glitch, a special "double-up" feature had to be internally activated. The men persuaded casino technicians to alter "soft" options on the machines, such as volume and screen brightness controls. Such perks aren't unusual for high-rollers, who can wager anywhere from a few hundred to thousands of dollars in one day.

One Meadows employee, who was not criminally charged or accused of wrongdoing, agreed to enable the double-up feature on the machine with the glitch.

Normally, such a feature would allow a player to risk doubling his winnings or potentially losing them all. The double-up feature isn't usually enabled on the machines in part because it's unpopular with most gamblers, who are unwilling to risk large amounts of money.

When the correct sequence of buttons was pushed, the machine displayed false double jackpots. No casino officials noticed because the bogus jackpots weren't being recorded in the machine's internal system.

Throughout April 2009, Mr. Kane frequented Las Vegas casinos, practicing his technique in a "test run," according to authorities, before calling his friend Mr. Nestor in Pennsylvania.

From May 1 to June 15 in 2009, agents said Mr. Nestor joined Mr. Kane in Las Vegas, where the duo allegedly cashed in phony jackpots "over and over again" and perfected a scheme to exploit the same glitch in casinos across the world."

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11004/1115414-58.stm#ixzz1AMex9IZo

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

Uhh... since when is a pseudo-RNG capable of driving a "legitimate game of chance"? Or do you not understand what "psuedo" means? And the stepper motors that drive the wheels past a winning combination that the user selected to prevent unscheduled payout should be enough to tell you that there are no games of chance to be found here.

"The rules", such as they are, are only manifest in the enforcement the machine provides. If the machine fails to properly enforce the intended rules, then the machine has failed, not the user. He played according to the machine. The machine failed to enforce human intent, but that's not the user's fault. The machine should've been tested and debugged so that it would not fail. If that raises the price of the machine, well, that's also not the user's problem.

The machine's manufacturer cut corners, the casino ignored quality problems, and the user took advantage of a poorly-enforced ruleset. This makes it distinctly not fraud.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[CodeShark]

At last, someone who read the article. Thank you!!

And for the record I am anti-gaming, anti-casino, but also anti-abuse of the gaming establishment, which seems weird until you realize one thing: The casino(s) are not in it to cheat stupid people out of their money. They are in it to make a profit margin based on the concept of fair play, meaning that "even if we make a bunch of money because of the margins and scale of the casino operation, everybody has an equal chance at getting the payouts.

It would sort of be like going to a restaurant where you paid the same amount for a burger, but sometimes you get the mini-burger with ketchup only and sometimes you get the big burger with everything on it. As long as we all have an equal chance of getting the big burger, and not to many small burgers (i.e. usually getting the "middle" burger), we might keep trying. And the restaurant makes say 7-10% of the overall total no matter what as profit. Now then, someone comes in and always pays the minimum price, and gets not only the big burger every time but two big burgers, because they have figured out how to trick a restaurant employee and then cheat the restaurant. Meaning that the restaurant has to give everyone else smaller burgers or raise the price of the burgers to cover the cost of the cheater. The cheater in the restaurant can be arrested for fraud, and maybe even the employee.

Get it the rest of y'all?

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd mod him informative if anyone could produce the claimed disassembled code, or evidence of it. Not saying he's incorrect, but would prefer evidence to speculation.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[dmayle]

Slot machines are a game of chance. Examine the disassembled code and you can see that the supposedly random outcomes are, in fact, random.

I used to work in the industry. Sure, the odds are programmed into the machine, but if you pull a jackpot, there is nothing in the code that prevents your very next pull from being a jackpot. Now, the odds of it are very slim, but very possible.

If you could slow down time, and examine perfectly the inner state of the machine, it would be possible to pull a jackpot every time, without 'cheating', it's just the odds of this occurring in real life have been programmed in.

As an aside, most slots are programmed to pay out between 80% and 98% of the money put into them. (I think I have those figures correct, but it's been years since I've worked in the industry.) This is different depending on locale (e.g. France has laws that specify these ranges, where Nevada has only a minimum, not a maximum). This means that in certain casinos, there are winner slot machines programmed to pay out 101% of the money played over time, so if you sit at them all day, you can't lose. However, when you look at the numbers, playing 100,000 dollars over a day will only net you 1000 dollars.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Jane Q. Public]

I am not sure which side you are arguing, but again: this is a direct result of the machine failing to actually produce a game of chance, because of flaws in the machine. Let me give you another example that may be more clear:

The rules of poker are also based on statistics, and there are several variants of poker, each of which carries its own set of odds for outcomes. Let's say a casino comes up with a new variant of poker, and subtly miscalculates in one area. If a player detects this flaw in the game, and exploits it, is that "cheating"? How can it be? He or she is still playing by the official rules.

In the same way, if a machine has a flaw that improperly pays players that play in a certain way, they are not in any way cheating. The machine was designed that way. ALL the responsibility belongs to those who manufacture, certify, and employ the machines. The player(s) did nothing wrong.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Jane Q. Public]

No. Completely wrong. It doesn't matter what purpose the company exists for, it matters what the company does.

If a company makes a mistake in their posted prices, for example, and a customer comes in and notices (although we have to assume most people didn't notice), then, at least in most states I daresay, the customer is legally entitled to purchase the product at that price. It is the company's error, not the customer's.

Similarly, if a company calculates improper odds in a game of chance, and only a few customers notice, they are not "cheating" or "stealing" by exploiting that advantage, any more than the customer above who noticed the incorrect price. It is the company's mistake, not the customer's. They are responsible for the way they conduct their business.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep We use this in game design. It's called a reward schedule. It's the same thing that keeps korean mothers playing farmville till their children die.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

Slot machines are a legitimate game of chance, just like blackjack is a legitimate game of chance. The result isn't a 50/50 shot that you're going to win because of simple probabilities, but the random numbers being generated are indeed random, and the result is not fixed.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[buybuydandavis]

As you say, the only question is whether exploiting this flaw is illegal. And I think it has to be illegal. ...
But this man allegedly knew the details of the bug, then deliberately set out to trigger it as much as possible.

So if the Casino's know the bugs in *our* software, know that we don't estimate probabilities well, knows that alcohol, sensory overload in sound and lights, and particular payout schemes all make it worse, and deliberately set out to trigger these bugs as much as possible, then they're doing something illegal?

From what I can see, the guys convinced the Casinos to set their machines in a way that the Casinos would lose, and the Casinos consented.

Everything was entirely voluntary on the Casinos' part. Just as everything is voluntary when I walk into a Casino. They know their software has bugs and flaws. They choose to play. I know my software has bugs and weaknesses. I choose to play.

All I see is that it is illegal to knowingly exploit a statistical advantage against a casino, but not illegal for the casino's to exploit statistical advantages against us.

The difference is not in justice, it is in who has the most lawyers, and who can afford to buy legislators.

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[AmiMoJo]

Some things have an element of randomness but key parts of the game are either pre-determined by logic or at least heavily biased. It's nothing new or unusual. For example pub quiz machines tend to give you two easy questions to start and then a hard one to make you loose just before reaching the first payout. It keeps the punter thinking they could win if they just tried one more time...

Re:I think this probably ought to be illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

Two problems: (a) I don't know how I'm going to attach my bit of plastic to an email; (b) what's this Personal Identification Number Number (sic) that you want?

Comedians perform a set.

[apparently]

I once gave the Bally's box office $135 to see George Carlin do a show that, I was disappointed to realize, I'd seen him do on HBO six months before. I'm sure he got a fat slice of that.

He always was a funny guy, and nailed it when he's right, but he's not immune to the double standard, hypocrisy, or half-though-out premise.

Holy sweet hell, this is like watching a broadcast performance of The Nutcracker, catching a live performance 6 months later, and complaining that the theatre company put on the same show. Outside of an improv act, comedians perform a written set; were you under the assumption that they write brand new jokes for each performance, or that they don't perform a routine verbatim, with a specifically crafted opening, middle, and closing set? 6 months is not a long time for a comedian's set to change. There's no double-standard, hypocrisy, or half-thought-out premise, especially in response to the comment you're responding to.

thanks for the info

[FudRucker]

I will never visit a casino ever again

Re:double standard - Don't think so

[icebike]

Read the story:

The pair, according to police, had knowledge of a software glitch in one of the high-bet slot machines. In order to expose the glitch, a special "double-up" feature had to be internally activated. The men persuaded casino technicians to alter "soft" options on the machines, such as volume and screen brightness controls. One Meadows employee, who was not criminally charged or accused of wrongdoing, agreed to enable the double-up feature on the machine with the glitch.

He didn't win by just pushing buttons.

He convinced an employee to open the machine and turn on a feature he knew was faulty. That feature was off by default.

He had prior knowledge, and used social engineering to have someone else enable this feature for him.

As usual, the SlashDot summary glosses over this and spins a tale of an innocent bystander getting blindsided for "doing nothing wrong".

entertainment

[KingAlanI]

If you keep yourself under control, it's an entertainment expense which is partially paid back by the smaller payouts and really paid back on the off-chance that you hit bigger prizes.

Myself, I play handfuls of the state-lottery dollar scratchoffs [the odds on these aren't all that great, but they're better than the nightly draw games and proportional to the odds on the expensive scratchoffs.]

It's not fun when you get out of control anyway.

Considering the "entertainment expense" category, traveling to gamble seems kind of analogous to traveling for an out-of-town concert. (Neither the local lottery retailers nor the local music clubs may be enough for the respective enthusiasts all the time.)

See signature; I'm not ideologically opposed to large _entertainment_ corporations, either.

Slots

[KingAlanI]

Yeah, I hear slot machines have some of the worst odds, and they seem to be amongst the most boring to play. Some of the table games might be a different story.
I might play a bit if I happen to be near a casino for some other reason.
[For example, I might have gone to a concert in Atlantic City, but that was scratched when the musician in question later announced a Buffalo date]

New Las Vegas

[Fnord666]

It's just a good thing for him that he pulled this stunt in the new Las Vegas. If you want to find someone who tried something like this 30 years ago in the old Las Vegas, just take a shovel and drive about 20 miles out into the desert. The old saying was that what happened in Vegas got buried in Vegas.

smart evolutionary thinking in these comments.

[KingAlanI]

taking gambles might be very advantageous in life, although probably not in casino's.

Yes, this may be the negative misfiring of something that's normally beneficial in our environment.

Just one more reason...

[stumblingblock]

not to throw money away at casinos, ESPECIALLY on slot machines

I have done this too, in Pennsylvania

[Anonymous Coward]

But not at a casino. There are lots of 8 liner machines in bars here. A certain strain of 8 liner has a weakness that can be exploited, if you know the game. In the end, the machine will never pay out more than it takes in. The house never loses, but you can change when the payout happens. Basically, you juice all of the winnings out of the machine and it plays very tight until it hits the payoff ratio again. Now that I see this, I guess I'm fortunate that these little gambling operations are illegal. I have been barred from playing at a couple of establishments. They don't know what my exploit is, but they do notice if you win more often than they think you should.

Played the game as presented.

[inthealpine]

This is probably how it will go down:

A.
The gambler was playing the game as it was presented by the casinos with no knowledge of changing or changed configurations. In this case he again 'played the game as it was presented' and would be entitled to all his winnings. There was a case like this with video Keno where a RNG chip was not set or installed properly on the machines. The player was using chaos theory math to find the next outcome and hit more than a few jackpots in a row before the game was shut down. What the 'math whiz' actually stumbled on was that each night the keno machines were turned off and the RNG would start at the beginning of the same extremely long string of numbers. No chaos theory or math needed.
The outcome was that the man 'played the game as it was presented' and was entitled to his winnings.


Sorry about the gambling links, but this is the story. Link: http://www.blackjackforumonline.com/content/how_to_beat_keno.htm
B.
Another way this could go is if the player had inside knowledge like a programmer telling him what combination of buttons to press to exploit the software. I had read of this happening and since the game was altered to change the outcome there was no entitlement to the winnings.
C.
One story that I disagreed with the outcome to was a man (perhaps the same from example B, I don't remember) who did not have access to the particular casinos systems as he didn't work their, but wrote a program to predict the Keno outcome. It took a while, but he did finally win some big money and it was determined that he wasn't entitled to it because he used a computer program to 'guess'. If that computer program was taken from his 'old casino job' then fine, but if he just wrote a program and played the game he should have been entitled to the winnings.

I appreciate his ability to hack the machines...

[makubesu]

but I've been hitting the jackpot in Casinos for years using this tried and true form of hacking: xkcd.com/538/

Well, duh...same rules as Wall Street.

[ibsteve2u]

If you're not a high roller, you're not supposed to win.

Charge the gov't & casinos with racketeering..

[Anonymous Coward]

see how far ya get, sucker!

Enforce, obey, or be beaten on..

authoritys divine law.

haha

very similar to game show exploit

[tal775]

This is the same exploiting a "software error" concept as the mid-80s game show "Press Your Luck" where a contest http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Larson won far bigger than anyone before him by taking advantage of a poorly planned game, in a legal way.

In that game, CBS reluctantly paid the winnings, and fixed the error so that no one else did it. The casino should do the same since he wasn't shaking the machine, putting coat hangers up the coin return or other such hacks that clearly aren't ok. Asking to turn up the volume or brightness, was ok with the casino employee, even if it unknowingly activates the bug.

I don't see how this could hold up in court. If they can't get the devs to fix it, then take the problem machines off the floor, or implement security in the same way as done to watch card counters. If someone wins more than x times at a machine, or racks up more than $x winnings, pay it out and ask them to leave. Card counters aren't charged with "receiving stolen property", and that's also exploiting an inherent flaw in those games. The casinos bought and paid for the software on their machines, and should be accountable for any flaws in their purchase.

I've been to the casino in question, and have to wonder on any future trips, if I win legitimately even without exploiting anything, will I have unknowingly hit the "Stop" button at a time that could be considered a hack, and be in the same boat as this guy?

Decapping for fun and profit

[Anonymous Coward]

mamedev has some working gambling games up for inspection. Last 30 years, lots of memorable chips. Love the Visual 6502 (Bender!)

Error?

[koinu]

I call that a strategy.

It is called Gabling!!!

[www.sorehands.com]

If the person wins because of a software bug, the Casino should pay!

It is called Gambling! The Casino is Gambling on the reliability of the software.

It's not finding the errors

[kikito]

It's exploiting them what gets you jail.

stolen from casinos

[doperative]

> federal government suspects the group may have stolen as much as $1.4 million from various casinos ..

Since when, they discovered loopholes in the software and exploited them ...

Maybe you are not that smart

[Anonymous Coward]

If you were smart enough, you would play and win enough money to live, but not too much money to be noticed. Other parameters to take into account maybe using different locations and timings.

Slot machines like the lottery

[Shivetya]

are a direct tax on stupid.

Stories about slot machines, for the most gambling establishments in general, are in the news a lot and none of them positive, yet people still go. It is no different than the guy walking into the convenience store buying a lottery ticket and a pack of smokes all the while thinking he will strike it lucky with the first and the second will never happen to him

Roger Miller Said It Best

[Anonymous Coward]

"I drove my Cadillac to Vegas to satisfy my lust / Wheelin', Dealin', left old Vegas on a Greyhound Bus"

integer

[Anonymous Coward]

I look forward to when a slot machine will pay me $2 147 483 647

Government is the chicken

[Anonymous Coward]

Government holds the key here, not the casino. The casino doesn't hold the power to make laws or employ coercion as their means -- they are beholden to the law every bit as much as the slot machine winner. If they succeed in attacking him, the fault lies entirely with goverment.

Government is the chicken, not the casino.

Re:Government is the chicken

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

You have taken the wrong-coloured pill...

Government, in the form it takes in "modern, western economies" is merely the "rent-a-cop" for enforcement of business wishes. It is also the convenient foil, used by these oligarchal and meta-legal plutocrats, to misdirect blame and frustration of the populace - who are trained to see government as the cause of their oppressions, not the instrument used by their oppressor.

Phantom Menace.

Re:Government is the chicken

[Unequivocal]

I don't have a reference to who said this, but there's an aphorism to describe what you're saying:

"Nothing is illegal if 20 businessmen decide do it."

Casinos are a perfect example of this fact.

Conference in Vegas

[BenEnglishAtHome]

...so many conferences are there...

I work for a large, U.S. gov TLA. For us, Vegas conferences are banned. We made the newspapers once, a decade ago, with a conference of managers in Vegas enjoying themselves and were painted as a bunch of libertines sponging off the public. Now, for public relations reasons only, no function is allowed to fly anyone to Vegas for meetings, conferences, training, anything. It doesn't matter how much economic sense it makes. It wouldn't matter if a hotel comped every single thing to the agency. The rule is "No Vegas. Period."

I wonder how many other organizations operate under the same rule?

Re:Conference in Vegas

[DavidTC]

I don't know how often it happens, but that's exceptionally stupid. Those managers who were 'enjoying themselves' were subsiding your conference out of their own pocket. No one was gambling or visiting strippers or whatever on the public dime.

But the general public is stupid.

Where they should ban conferences is exactly the other way around. Places like the Panama City or something, where the entertainment is 'cheap' (Because people just go to the beach) and the hotels are expensive. Vegas has the cheapest hotels of any major city (Sometimes their prices are surreal, like cheaper than some random Motel 6 to stay in a real hotel with room service and indoor gym and whatnot.), and the cheapest conference space too.

More details please

[Anonymous Coward]

If it is a software glitch how did he exploit it? He claim all he did was gamble normally (IE: pressed buttons).
I would like to now more about this glitch and the how he exploited it.... ultimately I would like to verify his techniques at my local casino.

Solution

[DarthVain]

Don't Gamble.

or

Don't Gamble at Casino's that have their customers arrested for their mistakes.

or

Don't Gamble using electronic slot machines.

All of the above would have more effect on the Casino's in questions than probably anything else.

Casinos are run by criminals

[Anonymous Coward]

You can 'legalize" gambling all you want, criminals will still run the operations.

What did you t hink was going to happen?

Technically the house must have better odds

[perpenso]

I believe that gambling is fundamentally stupid, but if the state is going to allow it, the state should allow it on terms that are equally favorable to the plebes and the casinos.

Technically the house (casinos) have to have slightly better terms (odds). A profit margin must exist to pay for the service they are providing. Whenever I am in Vegas I marvel at the casino complexes and what a few percentage points of advantage can accumulate into. Its testimony on a monumental scale that you are probably going to lose.

Re:Technically the house must have better odds

[anegg]

I didn't state clearly what I was trying to say... I understand that there might be couple of points favoritism to the house with the odds, and I'll accept that as the cost of the enterprise.

The point I intended to make was about the advantage the house has over the players in how the rules are enforced. The house can nullify a large Video Lottery Terminal jackpot if the house determines that the jackpot violated pre-determined odds of paying out. However, the players have virtually no ability to determine whether the odds of them losing are equally well-policed. In the cases where jackpots have been nullified, I don't see any corresponding refunds given to all of the players playing the "malfunctioning" machine prior to the "unplanned jackpot" that is nullified.

I think the terms of the bet should be the same for both. If the casino puts the machine into service, they should have to live with the results of the machine's play, whether it fits their pre-determined odds or not. At the same time, every effort should be made to make sure the machines work properly. But large jackpots should not be nullified.

accountability

[Puzzles]

Are the casinos suing the manufacturer of the machines? They sold a faulty product that caused them to lose alot of money. Did the developer plant this bug on purpose? Maybe the developer took the smarter approach and decided to not exploit the problem in such excess--enough to not be noticed. In these games of little strategy and randomness, a player looks for ways to win. The casinos exploit an apparent bug in most peoples' understanding that they have a chance to actually turn a profit at a casino--tricks used to take money from "customers" in exchange of no goods and hardly what I'd call services.

Anonymous Coward

[Anonymous Coward]

You guys make me laugh. First, you say it's the guy's right to find and exploit a glitch, good for him. Next, you say shame on Vegas for profiting on players' stupidity and taking their money.

Anyone else see the massive contradiction going on here?

Who's responsible?

[xenobyte]

Who's responsible for the errors in the first place?

Either some developer didn't test his product properly, or his employer failed to do so before accepting it and putting it into production.

Anyone who has done Computer Science 101 at a decent university or college knows that you can design tests and run those to prove 100% that no flaws exist in your code. It's usually called 'internal testing' and basically you test everything from the inside out, starting with the smallest 'lego' (typically helper algorithms) and work your way up into the more complex structures. As you know the building blocks works (because you already have tested those), testing the more complex things becomes easy, although extremely tedious. Back when I did CS we made a small 'chess display' program (show a chess board, enter moves and it validates the input then validate the moves according to the rules and finally update the board and wait for the next input) which took about 200 lines of code (Pascal I think it was). Testing this thing took well over 1.000 individual tests but then we could prove that it would behave exactly as it should no matter what input you gave it - barring hardware and OS malfunctions of course.

Testing something like an operating system with millions of lines of code would require trillions of tests, but these could fairly easily be machine generated while parsing the code and batch executed.

I have no idea how complex the 'operating system' for a slot machine is, but it can be tested just like everything else, and failing to do so is a major mistake in my book, one that should cost.

If I were to decide I'd make the slot machine provider/developer liable for the losses incurred by casinos in cases like this. They provided the means for the fraud to take place and should thus be liable for damages. I do know of a case where a manufacturer of roulette tables that knew about some imbalance in the wheel but didn't fix it, ended up covering the losses incurred by casinos where the knowledge was exploited to place winning bets.

He enjoys his kneecaps

[Anonymous Coward]

Silence is golden.

Playing the System = Stealing?

[stewbacca]

I'm wondering, if I give a bank teller a $20 bill and say can I get two $20s back in change, and they do it, does that make me a thief?

Re:Playing the System = Stealing?

[bws111]

Yes. Technically you are a thief even if you didn't ask them to do it and they did anyway. If you take something you know you don't have a right to you are a thief, no matter how the thing wound up in your possession.

Re:Playing the System = Stealing?

[stewbacca]

I'd like to see precedent where somebody was prosecuted for a bank giving you wrong change and you keeping it. Thats not stealing.

Re:Playing the System = Stealing?

[bws111]

They probably wouldn't prosecute you for $20 dollars, because it isn't worth it. However, for a case more applicable to this one, see http://current.com/news/92888249_bank-error-in-your-favor-go-to-jail.htm

How about "contests"

[phorm]

Let's say you like online contests. Not the "punch of monkey" ones, but ones that can win you real money/prizes, perhaps something like the McDonalds Monopoly game.

Now let's say you find a flaw in the system wherein you can always win, or at least win at an exponentially higher rate than normal. Maybe it doesn't parse an email address right and causes an SQL query or overflow, maybe there's something in the webpage that gives away answers to an important question.

Whatever the case, you manage to exploit it and rake in tons of prizes. Maybe it's cash. Maybe it's free cheeseburgers. Whatever. It's not just that you won once, and went, "wow, that's cool", but rather than you CONTINUALLY exploited the flaw to cash in.

You, maybe McD's could have built/bought a better system, but as we see, even ages-old well-tested systems can have flaws (see the recent PHP floating-conversion issue). But you continued to exploit the flaw, and essentially defraud the company. It's not a game or even a gamble at that point.

How about if you discovered that a silly error on your bank's website allows you to cause "negative" amounts for service charges. The vendor never actually gets a negative balance, but the cash in your account goes up. Is "the bank makes tons of money off of me anyhow" a valid excuse?

If you run across an error by accident, honest mistake. Keep abusing it to cash in, sounds like fraud to me.

continuing to discuss your code

[KingAlanI]

Yeah, I'm glad Python eventually got around to fixing that in v3, but it is annoying in v2. :)

Standard combinatorics with combinations not permutations. I just am rusty on what the underlying math is, even though I understand the concept. :)

I see where you plugged in the specific values of MegaMillions by hardcoding them.
How might the code be modified by a game with no MegaBall?

P.S. in response to your P.S:
Yeah, I'm relatively smart with money, but I could indeed use some help with something of this scale. Falls into the "problems I wish I had to deal with" category :P

BRB, off to play the PowerBall. :)

your code, with my comments

[KingAlanI]

http://www.mediafire.com/file/dhm7thh2whg3hwd/Chapter80's%20Lotto%20Numbercruncher.py

Here's your script, with the comments I've added based on our discussion