Mathematical Proof that English Harbour is cheating

[Linus]

I know that many of you want to believe that you've been cheated -

What players want to believe, is that if a casino is caught cheating, there will be consequences.

Internet casinos - unlike B&M's - are not regulated. They don't have to worry about losing their licenses , and 99% of the time, a player has zero recourse, and no way of knowing how - or even whether - he was cheated. So in the 1% of the time when a game was not only unfair, but proven to be biased in favor of the casino, players would like to see something done about it.

What players want is some sense of security that the games are actually fair. Or, failing that, at least a sense that there are consequences when a casino cheats.

Players DO NOT "want to believe they've been cheated."

They want to believe the games are fair.

and that many of you believe I've been bought, as well as the Wiz -

All I can say is that - outside of the internet casino industry - "conflict of interest" rules would generally prevent someone from offering advice or analysis if they had a financial interest in the case at hand.

I realize the internet gambling doesn't work under the same rules as other industries. That's why sites like CasinoMeister are so important.

In the short run, sweeping something like this under the rug may seem like the best thing for internet gambling. But the industry is asking players to deposit money on faith - faith that they'll be paid if they win, faith that their deposits won't be stolen, and faith that the games are fair. In the long run, anything that undermines that faith is bad for everyone - not only for the players (who can, after all, always go to land-based casinos and get free drinks along with fair games) but for the casinos and their affiliates as well.

There will always be casinos that cheat their players. That's just human nature - especially in the gambling industry, where the risks are so small, and the rewards are (potentially) so great.

What players are looking for - hoping for - is that there is someone with influence in the industry who is both willing and able to put the long-term interests of everyone over the short-term interests of the casinos.

If you believe players want to think they've been cheated (maybe I've misunderstood you), you have no business representing players anywhere, to anyone, and especially not at an internet gambling conference.

[spearmaster]

Last post before I go... LOL...

Code is in Java. The doubling game itself was not modified, but new code which had been introduced and which would give the player an OPTION to additionally risk his double bet in a bonus game was being tested, and in typical programming testing fashion left open so that it would occur 100% of the time, and assumed that player had selected the bonus game.

This code was NEVER meant to be uploaded, and certainly not in this fashion. If there was incompetence, it was by whoever allowed this code to be uploaded.

Linus - I have already established that there is no conflict of interest many times over and I do not wish to do it again. There will not be sweeping anything under the rug - I am going to expose everything that happened in as open a fashion as I can, with detailed explanations and hopefully, if I have the time, with graphic diagrams which show how this could happen.

You are not going to get a 50-word post full of hot air - this post may well turn out to be the longest in Casinomeister history (assuming there is not a message length restriction in the forums LOL).

[kengam]

nah this will never get to winning screenshots length.

Spear, what makes you think they never used this buggy code before April of this year? This code would still be used now if it wasn't investigated here. I am posting to let others know that this buggy code was in place at other times before. The only reason I even came to this forum was because I saw a link elsewhere and it reminded me of my team's horrible sessions with the double up game. The numbers posted here did not even surprise me. What did surprise me was the fact that the for fun version ran on the same software platform. Had I known that for sure I would have saved mid 5 figures. It would be much easier for English Harbour to deny my claim and produce the numbers than for me to share my evidence. If I was the EH manager then I would do just that as I am not going to let this go simply because you feel the burden of proof is on me when the casino has already been caught with buggy code that was cheating players.

[soflat]

I was away from the internet for a week and apparently nothing has changed.

Sure, EH provided buggy software code to be looked at, but we ALREADY KNEW the code had a bug, right?

Anyways, the code does not prove intention, except intention to institute a NON-RANDOM CARD-BASED BONUS FEATURE, right?

Why haven't they released data to an independent third party yet?

Why not let a truly independent third party look at three years worth of logs? Just because there is no proof of wrongdoing earlier than April? No data, no proof.

How come we can't even have a poll? (I know, because someone has to decide for us when we have enough data. But EH haven't released the data to an independent party yet, have they?)

[kengam]

Apparently Spearmaster feels that we need to have concrete evidence of wrongdoing prior to April of this year to warrant a request to see all of the numbers from double up dating back 3 years. Apparently he also feels that there is not enough information to warrant having a poll. Maybe we should have a poll to determine if there is enough information to have a poll? This whole ordeal smells bad...real bad. I am very disappointed to say the least.

[sirius]

Last post before I go... LOL...

Code is in Java. The doubling game itself was not modified, but new code which had been introduced and which would give the player an OPTION to additionally risk his double bet in a bonus game was being tested, and in typical programming testing fashion left open so that it would occur 100% of the time, and assumed that player had selected the bonus game.

This code was NEVER meant to be uploaded, and certainly not in this fashion. If there was incompetence, it was by whoever allowed this code to be uploaded.

It appears from this statement that you seem to have already made up your mind that it was never meant to be uploaded and it was really part of a double up bonus. Let me ask you why would they add such a bonus round in video poker? I've not seen it anywhere else. The player can already choose to repeatedly double up as many times as they want. You think they were going to add an extra option? Can anyone describe how this supposed bonus game was supposed to work when finished?

How this would have the side effect of selecting lower cards is mind boggling. How on earth is that possible - it sounds as if this supposed bonus game wasn't going to be a fair deal? If this was really a test for the bonus game, what purpose did it serve as there is no bonus game evident at all. This just sounds like a good way of cheating the game.

No one has yet explained how the results from May 1st were a few thousand to one chance of using the unfair code. The code was supposed to have been changed on May 2nd.

[soflat]

I'm not a programmer so can someone explain how you can tell from the code whether they intended to upload the buggy code?

Also, were they working on a non-random card game, or did I miss something?

There is a lot left to explain (the May 1st anomaly, for example).

[thelawnet]

I am a programmer and having difficulty understanding how this program would even function at all given the Spearmaster's post.

Correct.

If variables are missing, as described, the code would not compile at all.

If it would not compile, it could not possibly be the code they had on their servers.....

It seems more likely that they hacked up some crappy code to fit their story, which is why it appears that it would not run - because it doesn't!

[HateMG]

If variables are missing, as described, the code would not compile at all.

If it would not compile, it could not possibly be the code they had on their servers.....

It seems more likely that they hacked up some crappy code to fit their story, which is why it appears that it would not run - because it doesn't!

I'll try to disagree. Although it's probably unlikely but I think it's possible.
Let's say you have 2 classes : class1 and class2. Class2 was just created and you're trying to pass a variable from class1 to class2.
So: class1.varA = class2.varB. You compiled both classes with no problem, you even tested in development, but then you release to production just the changes that you made in class1 and forgot or did not want to release class2 at that particular time. Let's say you can not under any circumstances throw an exception and instead you have some IF statement that sets var1 to null. Would it work?

Again I'm not trying to defend EH. I never played there and never will. But from programming point of view it's possible to have such bug.

[thelawnet]

I'll try to disagree. Although it's probably unlikely but I think it's possible.
Let's say you have 2 classes : class1 and class2. Class2 was just created and you're trying to pass a variable from class1 to class2.
So: class1.varA = class2.varB. You compiled both classes with no problem, you even tested in development, but then you release to production just the changes that you made in class1 and forgot or did not want to release class2 at that particular time. Let's say you can not under any circumstances throw an exception and instead you have some IF statement that sets var1 to null. Would it work?

Again I'm not trying to defend EH. I never played there and never will. But from programming point of view it's possible to have such bug.

I do not know how Java handles references. But I would have thought that it would have noticed that the reference was not to the same version of class2 and would not run.

Anyway, this is somewhat impoissible to judge without the source code....

If what they say is true it does sound like the kind of place where you'd be mad to play. It sounds like they have no release management process, no development/production code tree, and essentially no understanding of how to run a software project. This is pretty unbelievable for a financial application like a casino. All changes should be documented and first implemented in development. It should not be possible for them to go straight into production like this.

I might expect this at a two-bit company producing websites for £2,000 a time, but not a casino. Do they expect us to believe that their software is high quality and reliable when they run their development like this?

Hacked and incomplete code will always happen.

Incompetent development practices are just shitty management symptomatic of a development procedure that is incapable of releasing high-quality code due to poor process - regardless of the quality of the coders.

I would be very worried about the rest of their code that we haven't scrutinised so carefully, as it's evident that they don't run their build/test/release process in anything other than a shambolic incompetent amateurish manner, with the inevitable result of faulty code.