The Kahnawake Gaming Commission announced today that it has formed an “Independent Monitoring Team” tasked with completing “a full forensic audit/investigation of the online gaming business” of both UltimateBet and Absolute Poker. The two scandal-ridden sites are operated by Tokwiro Enterprises, which is owned by former Kahnawake chief Joe Tokwiro Norton. Norton also founded Mohawk Internet Technologies, the so-called “utility” company that makes online poker possible in North America.
The IMT will be headed by Frank Catania (pictured), a former Assistant Attorney General and Director of the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement. Catania has been a longtime advocate for the regulation of online gaming and has spoken before Congress on the issue. Catania currently serves on the board of a number of gaming related businesses and has his own consulting business.
According to the release, which was signed by the KGC’s senior adviser Murray Marshall, the IMT will be empowered “to have full access to interview all employees, past or present, review all records, contact and interview all sub contractors and individuals whom the monitoring team believes necessary.”
Of course the KGC has no power to compel any past employee to make themselves avail for such interview so good luck with that.
The KGC goes on further to say that “[i]n the event that any criminal activity is found to have occurred, such activity will be reported to the appropriate authorities for possible prosecution.”
We had the chance to ask Marshall this afternoon when he thinks this could take place and he offered the below video response.
Marshall’s complete statement on behalf of the KGE after the jump . . .
UltimateBet’s Annie Duke spoke before Congress last November on behalf of the PPA in support of government regulation.
Chairman of the Poker Players Alliance Senator Alfonse D’Amato has just issued a statement on behalf of the PPA addressing the online poker cheating scandals that haven’t so much rocked the poker world as they’ve just provided good forum fodder for a small group of poker players at a website run by creepy old dudes while having absolutely no negative effect on the bottom line for the folks at Absolute Poker and UltimateBet.
In the statement, which will likely have all the efficacy of a Hans Blix letter to Kim Jong-Il, D’Amato calls for officials at AP, UB and the Kahnawake Gaming Commission to “provide a full and transparent accounting of these breaches of the public trust to help lift the black cloud that has been placed over the industry.”
D’Amato then argues that the abuses by insiders at both AP and UB show the need for government regulation as it is the government’s “basic responsibility” to “provide assurances” to consumers.
Says D’Amato:
“The recent cheating scandals underscore the need for U.S. licensing and regulation of online poker to help protect consumers” . . .
“The federal government cannot continue to abdicate this basic responsibility to millions of its citizens who choose to play poker on the Internet. The attempt to enforce an outright prohibition of online poker is deeply flawed and unworkable, not to mention it invades upon the personal freedoms of law-abiding adults who wish to engage in a game of skill.”
For what Ultimate Bet spokesperson Annie Duke said before Congress on behalf of the PPA last November go here.
Related stories:
:: Russ Hamilton Has Some Explaining To Do About UltimateBet Super User Accounts
:: BREAKING: 60 Minutes Interviews Mark Seif, Mike Sexton, Greg Raymer on Online Poker Cheating Scandal
:: Mark Seif on Absolute Poker Scandal: “I Had Nothing To Do With This”
:: Absolute Poker Says ‘Geek’ Employee Hacked System, Unicorns are Real
Sweet, we finally found a reason to use a photo of Canseco’s girlfriend’s cleavage.
Super sleuth Nat Arem discovered something super interesting about super-round Russ Hamilton, a former UltimateBet boss, when he was looking up the address for some of the super user accounts involved in the UB scandal.
The long awaited 60 Minutes feature on the Absolute Pokeronline poker cheating scandal took a big step to hitting the small screen today. And Wicked Chops Poker is the only site with photos of the news event.
Anchor Steve Kroft, 62, interviewed Mark Seif (wearing an Absolute Poker jersey), Mike Sexton (not wearing a Party Poker one), Linda Johnson (why? was Shari Flanzer unavailable?), and Greg Raymer (wearing a Poker Stars shirt). The interviews took place in an empty Rio Amazon Room around 11am.
We overheard Raymer discussing the need for the U.S. American government to regulate online poker, and we can surmise because we’re smart-like-that that the rest of the messaging from the group was on point with the PPA’s platform. Raymer, a Libertarian, said he doesn’t see why the government should regulate his actions if they cause no harm to others. Johnson (why her again?) and Sexton both agreed with the need for regulation and taxation.
The wild card in this mix is that 2+2 poster and founder of the AbsolutePokerCheats.com website (here), Michael Josem, was also interviewed. How the stories weaved by Seif and Josem regarding the Absolute scandal will surely be a focal point of the piece and may eventually influence (ever so slightly) how legislators decide to handle the legality of online poker moving forward.
Unfortunately, word from our sources indicate that this 60 Minutes feature will be an outright "hatchet job" on the online poker industry. Although that’s really not much of a shocker. But it’s certainly not good news either.
More photos from the interviews below. The one of Josem with Seif in the background (second from left) is particularly great.
View the full 60 Minutes online poker scandal photo galleryhere. If you swipe photos we appreciate the link back to WCP. And definitely re-watch Mark Seif’s interview on the Absolute scandal from last October here or view it in its entirety after the jump.
Online poker is about to get some unwanted mainstream media attention.
Word from various sources is that 60 Minutes, the venerable television news program watched mostly by people who do the early bird and smell like mothballs, is doing an investigative story on the Absolute Poker insider cheating scandal, which didn’t so much rock the online poker world last October as much as it became forum fodder for a few weeks then fizzled.
According to Nat Arem, the Atlanta kid who helped break the scandal wide open, veteran reporter Steve Kroft will be getting his Mike Wallace on in places like Canada, Costa Rica and Las Vegas as he does a “soup to nuts” piece on how AJ Green, a VP at Absolute Poker, was able to swindle millions of dollars from online poker players by using a “super user” account that allowed him to see opponent’s hole cards.
“A few weeks ago, I was contacted by 60 Minutes in conjunction with a reporter from the Washington Post regarding a story about the Absolute Poker scandal from last fall. I was told that they wanted Adanthar and myself for on-camera interviews with Steve Kroft. I later found out they were also interested in interviewing Michael Josem and Marco Johnson. Basically, I spent a little while on the phone with the producer and the Washington Post reporter and recapped the whole story as well as I could from memory. I talked about my involvement and contribution, along with all the other people who were involved.”
A story at TechRader.com just came out today claiming that millions of dollars are being stolen from online poker players without many of them even knowing it.
Mikko Hyppönen, a software security experts, claims:
“Online poker players are a massive target for hackers . . . We were just investigating a case where a professional online poker player was attacked by someone he would play against regularly online. And we’re talking about professional players, and big money. Hundreds of thousands of euros on the table at a time.”
Hyppönen says that the one player lost hundreds of thousands of euros over a short time to some suspicious play, and when they investigated what was happening, they realized that the player’s software had been hacked so that another player could see his hole cards.
“[W]hen we looked into it we realised that one of the other players at the table had sent him a tool. A calculater to help optimise the poker playing or whatever. And we found that the application included a Trojan.”
“Which means that when he was playing online poker against these people who were in another country, the guy could press a button and he would receive a screenshot of the target’s screen. So he sees the hold cards. If you’re playing poker and the other players know your cards, it’s pretty hard to win.”
In related news, and really good news if you’re a punk ass, scum-of-the-earth cyber criminal, people you don’t even know are still stupid enough to download applications from you. Hack away!
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Word from various sources is that 60 Minutes, the venerable television news program watched mostly by people who do the early bird and smell like mothballs, is doing an investigative story on the 
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