Mathematical Proof that English Harbour is cheating

**spearmaster** · 5th May 2006, 09:14 PM

Oh and by the way, I think we should also be thanking thelawnet for exposing the problem in the first place. It does go to prove that when everyone pitches in, we have a much better chance of keeping the playing field level for everyone

**thelawnet** · 5th May 2006, 09:37 PM

Originally Posted by spearmaster

thelawnet, by "automatic" I think they meant "previously scheduled". And btw, they said "automatically corrected by an update", not "automatically updated".

That is fair enough. But firstly the Video Poker has been the same as it is now for a long time. It's hard to see why they would have changed it around April 13, as it's been there for months and nothing should need to be changed.

Be that is it may, and assuming they had a reason to update that code, it is just unbelievable that they would later fix the code again without knowing that it was broken. They must have known they had fixed it with the May 3rd update, so to deny that there was a problem is implausible and damaging to their credibility and makes a mockery of their latest statement.

**Wildfire7** · 5th May 2006, 09:47 PM

It will be interesting to see if this bug has happened in earlier months pre jan 06 from the Wizards audits. If this kind of thing can happen even once every 18 months, and go undetected for just a couple of weeks, then that's a nice little profit for the Casino in question.

What reassurances do players now have that this kind of thing will not happen again. Confidence and trust in the software is paramount and players have a right to know what measures have been implemented so that a repeat is unlikely to happen in the future.

Simply saying that we had a bug, now we have fixed it, so don't worry, certainly doesn't restore my confidence. The very fact that an error like this can go undetected for nearly a month is pretty disturbing. But hey what do I know I am just a customer whose confidence in fair gaming has been shaken, because if it can happen in VP doubling, then how many other bugs are out their, that have not yet been dicovered?

Wildfire7

**thelawnet** · 5th May 2006, 09:58 PM

Originally Posted by Wildfire7

It will be interesting to see if this bug has happened in earlier months pre jan 06 from the Wizards audits. If this kind of thing can happen even once every 18 months, and go undetected for just a couple of weeks, then that's a nice little profit for the Casino in question.

Of course we don't know what is audited, or when, as the logs are not public. I am slightly confused actually that initially WoO promised to audit all logs back to January, and did not suggest that he had previously examined the logs for January, February and March. If the video poker doubling had specifically been examined for January, February and March he could have stated then that he had audited January, February and March's results, as part of his monthly audit, and therefore the problem must have started in April - there would be no reason to go back to January 1.

So I'm not sure that the statement today that the problem would have been identified in the routine April 2006 audit really stacks up. Certainly other audits (e.g., PWC at Microgaming) just look at percentage payouts on games, and do not necessarily cover matters as specific as this.

**spearmaster** · 5th May 2006, 10:04 PM

Originally Posted by thelawnet

That is fair enough. But firstly the Video Poker has been the same as it is now for a long time. It's hard to see why they would have changed it around April 13, as it's been there for months and nothing should need to be changed.

Be that is it may, and assuming they had a reason to update that code, it is just unbelievable that they would later fix the code again without knowing that it was broken. They must have known they had fixed it with the May 3rd update, so to deny that there was a problem is implausible and damaging to their credibility and makes a mockery of their latest statement.

The denial came before they actually looked at logs - and I fully agree that the initial statement was premature and damaging and really was done without proper examination of the issue at hand.

I am not going to speculate on what changed or why - as a programmer, however, I will say that it is very easy to muck something up without even noticing you've done it until it's too late.. LOL... on the other hand, I don't program casinos, the mistakes I made don't cause any major problems for anyone but myself

Besides which, Microsoft is the king of bugs and vaporware - and yet 95% of us still use Windows...

**dresden** · 5th May 2006, 10:04 PM

I was just refunded $300+ from this error, glitch, malfeasance or whatever it really was. Thanks thelawnet.

This is just anecdotal but I utilised the doubling feature with real money in early mid-April and noticed I had an awful, awful run. I have been playing at English Harbour for 6 months or so and that was the first time I had a visceral reaction to my results. That is to say, I do not believe the doubling was unorthodox at any other point in my past play. This is in response to speculation about past errors, glitches or malfeasance. I have no evidence either way however.

**caruso** · 5th May 2006, 10:08 PM

Originally Posted by thelawnet

Be that is it may, and assuming they had a reason to update that code, it is just unbelievable that they would later fix the code again without knowing that it was broken. They must have known they had fixed it with the May 3rd update, so to deny that there was a problem is implausible and damaging to their credibility and makes a mockery of their latest statement.

This is what they said:

We have concluded our review of the game play and randomness for all Video Poker games. We have found, taking several sample sets over different and varying lengths of time, that they yield in our opinion, a non biased distribution of the cards.

So assuming we invest the "bug" story with any credibility at all: they had a problem, they knew about it, fixed it, lied about there ever being a problem - then changed their minds and acknowledged it.

We'll call that Scenario Number One.

Then there's Scenario Number Two:

There was a fix in the game, which ran until just after this thread was posted; within a day or so, as soon as they could get around to it, they pulled it - this squares with our members' results suddenly and somewhat mysifyingly normalising, which is an indisputable fact (the sudden normalising). They were TOTALLY caught with their pants down and rushed out the cover-up story (see above); with a little more time to get their heads around it, they realised the impossibility of the "non biased distribution of the cards" claim, and rolled out the "bug" story.

Which scenario squares with the facts as we know them?

**thelawnet** · 5th May 2006, 10:09 PM

Originally Posted by spearmaster

The denial came before they actually looked at logs - and I fully agree that the initial statement was premature and damaging and really was done without proper examination of the issue at hand.

I am not going to speculate on what changed or why - as a programmer, however, I will say that it is very easy to muck something up without even noticing you've done it until it's too late.. LOL... on the other hand, I don't program casinos, the mistakes I made don't cause any major problems for anyone but myself

It would be quite hard to introduce this kidn of bug I think. I cannot think how it could happen except by adding several deliberate lines of code.

And not to mention that, even if they did mess it up, they unmessed it. To change it back, you must know it is broken.... They tried to cover up and this is damning.

**kengam** · 5th May 2006, 10:11 PM

Spear has much more confidence in this group's ability to explain themselves than I do as I can not think of any possible way for them to save face on this. They added something to a fair program to cause it to deal unfairly to the players and then when it was exposed they then took it away and returned the game to its earlier form.

If it aint broke...don't fix it. Mike Shackleford does business with this company so while we can thank him for his help in analyzing the data, there is an obvious conflict of interest here.

**spearmaster** · 5th May 2006, 10:23 PM

I think I would tend to agree that in the majority of cases, a change in algorithms would normally require more than a line of code, and that typos generally can't happen as the code would return with an error and stop execution.

That being said, I still have one scenario in my own mind which could explain the abnormalities that were encountered but again I don't think it's wise to speak about it at the moment because I don't intend to open any avenue for escape, if you see what I mean.

Kengam - I'm not confident of anything at this stage - the only difference between me and everyone else at this point in time (other than being a moderator, of course) is the scenario I have referred to above. I have no vested interest in EH, as I do not market or affiliate with them (or anyone else at this time, though of course there are a few unused links on Awesome Jackpots.com LOL). In fact, my primary and voluntary mission at this time is to protect players from being ripped off or otherwise unfairly treated by rogue casino operations.

But I cannot do this at the expense of harming an operation unnecessarily or unfairly - there must be some sort of balance somewhere. So, while we are fresh from the battles... LOL... I think it's only fair to give EH a bit more time to explain exactly what happened, if at all.

If no explanation is forthcoming in a reasonable amount of time I will naturally be forced to assume that there is something to hide, at which point no further guarantees or warranties are made

Oh and by the way, I think you are unfairly tarring Mike Shackleford, who is and has always been an honest gentleman and well respected by everyone. While I agree that there is a relationship between him and OddsOn, he is very, very unlikely to risk his reputation to hide any irregularities (if any) for one of his clients. And he and I have enjoyed a close trusting relationship for almost as long as I've been in the industry and I will be more than happy to stake my own reputation on his reputation...