Kahnawake Final Decision on Poker Scandal That Rocked the Online World
The Kahnawake Gaming Commission has released its final decision in regards to the Ultimate Bet cheating scandal that shocked the online poker world into the real world of corporate cheating in the online gaming industry.
You’ll remember back in early January 2008, it all started when an online
poker player did an initial investigation on his own on another player by the online name of “NioNio” and discovered that the win rate of this particular account was statistically improbable. He posted his findings on the popular poker forum website 2+2, and it got a massive amount of interest. Online players around the world begun to scream for an investigation on NioNio as well as the poker client Ultimate Bet where the likely cheating seemed to be focused. Kahnawake Gaming Commission, which oversees a majority of the gaming licensing and acts as the overseer for online gaming integrity, began to launch its own investigation, and started to gather facts and information regarding the suspected cheating. The findings were released recently, and it shows quite a larger picture of corporate scandal than originally suspected.
All in all, the investigation into the scandal uncovered a total of 23 accounts, using 117 user-names associated with this particular operation. Although the report lists all the account numbers and user-names, it only names one 
person, Russel Hamilton, as being the prime beneficiary of the operation. A complete list of other names has been given to applicable law enforcement agencies by the commission, who will determine if sufficient evidence is available to pursue further legal action. However, the commission’s final report goes out of its way to focus on Hamilton’s involvement and suggests that the bulk of the funds that were collected during the illegal operation were transferred through Hamilton’s accounts.
The final report also suggests that the suspected cheating goes as far back as June 2003, however does not suggest how much funds were actually involved. However, it does outline that the owner of Ultimate Bet, Tokwiro Enterprises, was forced to payout over $22Million to various user’s accounts that were found to have been cheated out of their funds, as well as another $1.5Million in fines imposed by Kahnawake. The magnatude of this suggests that this illegal operation was indeed much larger in scope than originally suspected. The payback to the victims accounts was calculated using a formula that gave any benefit of the doubt to the victim, and it represents the largest such payback in history of online or land based gaming.
Tokwiro, and Ultimate Bet, continue in their daily business dealings, however are subject to surprise investigations and audits by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission at any time for the next 12 months. Also, the software that was in use at the time, which enabled the use of “SuperUser” accounts by the identification of AuditMonster1 and AuditMonster2, which were used to be able to see the hole cards of all opponents during live play, has been replaced and shelved. In addition, no individual may be employed by Tokwiro that has been deemed unfit by Kahnawake Gaming. To date, Tokwiro has met every condition the Gaming Commission has set forth, and will continue to do so going forward. Ultimate Bet is still a widely used poker client and is endorsed by several professionals including Phil Hellmuth Jr. and Annie Duke.
The complete report of the commissions’ final decision can be found here
http://www.kahnawake.com/gamingcommission/kgc091109b.pdf
All findings by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission have been made available to various law enforcement agencies to pursue further legal actions. The Gaming Commission is cooperating fully, and you can be sure that legal ramifications will soon surface for the individuals stated in the report. Stay tuned.
Kahnawake Gaming Commission Releases Final Decision re; Online Scandal - Poker Forum Canada said
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