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"Last up was Avi Rubin, a professor of computer science at Johns Hopkins. He talked, also relatively briefly, about how easy it is for some cheaters to exploit the game of online poker.
Essentially, Rubin argued, a hack called a Sybil attack--which employs fake people participating in games--makes it possible for online poker players to gain a big advantage over their opponents. That works, he said, by making it possible for a single player to control multiple hands in a game, allowing that person to see more cards than they would otherwise, and get a better handle on the odds of their own hand.
For example, he said, in a game of Texas Hold'em, a player employing a Sybil attack on an online poker game could control multiple hands and see things like whether the fives or eights they need to complete a full house and beat an opposing player's flush had already been played.
Rubin's point, then, was that game operators need to work harder at identity management, in order to keep players from employing such exploits. He didn't, however, offer any solutions as to how to do that.
All told, the panelists made it clear that just about any kind of online game or virtual world--especially those where money is on the line--is subject to some kind of hack or exploit, and that for those with the skills to launch such attacks, the barriers stopping them are easily surmountable.
The lesson, then, is that publishers of such games need to think harder about how to manage their players' actions and expectations. Otherwise, players may find themselves in games that are so compromised that the economies collapse and the fun disappears."
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but here is the excerpt concerning poker. This is the first I've heard of this, anyone else?"Last up was Avi Rubin, a professor of computer science at Johns Hopkins. He talked, also relatively briefly, about how easy it is for some cheaters to exploit the game of online poker.
Essentially, Rubin argued, a hack called a Sybil attack--which employs fake people participating in games--makes it possible for online poker players to gain a big advantage over their opponents. That works, he said, by making it possible for a single player to control multiple hands in a game, allowing that person to see more cards than they would otherwise, and get a better handle on the odds of their own hand.
For example, he said, in a game of Texas Hold'em, a player employing a Sybil attack on an online poker game could control multiple hands and see things like whether the fives or eights they need to complete a full house and beat an opposing player's flush had already been played.
Rubin's point, then, was that game operators need to work harder at identity management, in order to keep players from employing such exploits. He didn't, however, offer any solutions as to how to do that.
All told, the panelists made it clear that just about any kind of online game or virtual world--especially those where money is on the line--is subject to some kind of hack or exploit, and that for those with the skills to launch such attacks, the barriers stopping them are easily surmountable.
The lesson, then, is that publishers of such games need to think harder about how to manage their players' actions and expectations. Otherwise, players may find themselves in games that are so compromised that the economies collapse and the fun disappears."
