My Account at Pokerchamps has Been Emptied and I don't know where to turn

[92Cadillac]

I thought that maybe I would play a little poker before work last week so I signed on at Pokerchamps. Or at least I tried to. I kept getting a warning that I was using the wrong password. Funny because it worked the night before. I requested a new password and that went off without a hitch. But still it bothered me that my old one didn't work. I tried to sit at a table and was told that there was not enough money to sit there. What?? There was over $300.00 just 8 hours before. I told myself not to panic that there had to be a logical explanation. I've been playing there for almost a year without any trouble. Upon reviewing my transaction log there were 7 user to user transfers that wiped out my account. How could this be I asked. And am still asking. The only response I can get is that they are investigating and will get back to me. Or not. In the meantime my account has been suspended. I keep asking for the screen name of the user that my money was transferred to but they will not tell me. I figure that the money is gone and there is a lessoned to be learned however, my account is MY account and I think that I should have access to information such as names of transfers. My next step is contacting the Maltese Lottery and Gaming Authority I guess. Anyone have any suggestions?

[TheBloke]

Firstly, are Pokerchamps reputable and trustworthy? Check that first. I'm not saying they're not, I just don't know them myself.

Presuming they are entirely above board, there are three possibilities:
1) Your computer got hacked
2) Someone else in your household screwed you
3) You logged in while you were asleep or drunk and did the transfers yourself

I am assuming 2 & 3 are very unlikely, so number 1 seems most probable. You should immediately update your virus software with the latest definitions and do a complete system scan. You should also use Windows Update to ensure you have all the latest security patches.

If, when you do Windows Update, it downloads LOTS of patches, that would suggest that your computer was vulnerable, so a hack gets more likely even if the virus check comes up with nothing.

If you are missing lots of patches, and do not have any virus checking (or your virus definitions are very out of date), then a hack seems quite likely. If that is what happened then I'm afraid you're out of luck - the money is likely gone, I dont think the poker site will refund you.

However they absolutely should tell you who the transfers were made to - after all, as you say, it's your account! You certainly should be told that.

[Slotster!]

3) You logged in while you were asleep or drunk and did the transfers yourself

I am assuming 2 & 3 are very unlikely

Oh yes... VERY Unlikely... Yes, I'd never do anything like that myself. Never. Not once... Oh no, not me... Ahem.

[tantalos]

That's a rather strange case. Please let us know what happened, when you have more news... Good luck.

[Simmo!]

Presuming they are entirely above board, there are three possibilities:
1) Your computer got hacked
2) Someone else in your household screwed you
3) You logged in while you were asleep or drunk and did the transfers yourself

Or someone correctly guessed - or knew - your passowrd and logged on as you I guess. I'd have thought that was possible. Though these days there are lots of viruses flying around that act as key-loggers, so be very careful. Everyone.

If it was a key-logger, the poker-room will see the logon under a different IP at least. But they wouldn't necessariliy be liable. They may however be able to track the target user through their registration. But I would guess that anyone competent enough to write and distribute a key-logger would be clever enough to work out a way round that.

[liquidsoap]

Interesting they are pretty trustworthy i have never had a problem either.
Someone in your family or someone you knew sent it and didnt tell you....
But thankfully there is such thing as I.P's and they were at all repatable theyed get your money back......
Unless it was at your fault of course

[The Watchdog]

What do you mean trust worhty...

I have played on several poker rooms... Pokerchamps is very very bad.

The promised me first $3 for free...then... it took them about 2 weeks.

They don't have a chat, however they do answer emails fast.

To be honest their service is not that bad. But their software is way too slow.

I was a happy player at pokerstars, igot and absolute...

I play from time to time at poker time, but the pirma network has some several issues... but my humble opinion, pokerchamps is just a thumb down.

[liquidsoap]

What do you mean trust worhty...

I have played on several poker rooms... Pokerchamps is very very bad.

The promised me first $3 for free...then... it took them about 2 weeks.

They don't have a chat, however they do answer emails fast.

To be honest their service is not that bad. But their software is way too slow.

I was a happy player at pokerstars, igot and absolute...

I play from time to time at poker time, but the pirma network has some several issues... but my humble opinion, pokerchamps is just a thumb down.

Ok Id be slow getting your 3 dollars I bet its not top in their priority.
Anyword on this yet, interested to see what happened.

[mattysgirl]

If you really think it was not you (ie: had to much to drink dont remember..lol) beleive it or not I have a friend that did that. woke up and had no idea where her over 1k was, well we all so her blow it, needless to say we had fun teasing her that day lol we did try to stop her but she was loaded..lol

Ask the casino to give you the ip address where all these trasactions came from, now even an ip addres is not a for sure thing as they can be spoofed, use a proxy ect...mac address but then again those can be cloned as well.
So this is all dependent on the security s/w the casino uses.
I am a certified network professional, so i do know this area. There is s/w all over that shows people how to do these things, some can figure it out some can't (thank god they all dont.)

As for the keylogger it's possible that is was done by a hacker, it could have been in an email as applications can launch without you even knowing it, or you downloaded something that looked legit and was not.

Also key logger programs can be bought on a legit basis or you can just download them. Now i support keylogger use if you have kids and you suspect there up to no good on the internet (ie: teenagers and that darn myspace)

So in short there are a few scenarios that could have taken place.
if you beleive you were hacked then i would run anti virus, and also consider a complete format of your hard drive as you may not know what other information someone may have. If you dont have a up to date firewall get one.

If you do format and don't want to loose all you have on pc, do a backup if you find that to time consuming, there is a program that will let you get your data back even on a formated drive.
good luck!!

mattysgirl