Well, this is not going to be good for Absolute Poker, but at this point they deserve what is about to happen. Recently, there have been several players on Absolute that have been labeled by top online poker players as “super accounts” meaning that they either have inside access to real-time hands of other players, or have hacked into Absolutes program to be able to see others’ holecards, either way the evidence (hand histories) proving this are almost undeniable to anyone who truly understands poker. However, Absolute just came out and denied it.
Here is an excerpt from Mark Seif’s Blog in Absolute Poker’s official response to these claims:
“A ‘super-user’ account does not exist in our software. Absolute Poker was created by poker players who value security and fair play. The back-end of the Absolute Poker software prevents the possibility of any such feature. Our game client only receives data regarding individual’s hand and no other player hole cards are ever visible – by anyone – except in the event of a showdown. Having said that, we will continue this investigation as well as look into any other allegations of wrong-doing. If appropriate, we will freeze funds and reimburse effected players.”,
Notice they talk about how no player’s cards are visible to anyone except in the event of a showdown, but this also is not true, as they actually(and mistakenly) sent a complete Hand history of a 1k buyin tourney(this is actually what brought this to everyones attention as the account that won this tourney, called a huge allin heads up on the turn with 10 high, his opponent had 9 high), to the player who took 2nd that actually showed everyones hole cards even when there was no showdown.
Some of these hands will be posted here
WacoKidd, who has won some big bellagio tourneys this year as well as being a top online player says this in the above thread:
“ok so after Marco loses HU in the 1k to potripper (when potripper called his huge all in raise on the turn with T high) and reads a few posts suggesting foul play in the coming days, he requests the HH from Absolute… they sent him the HH for the tourny in a scrambled excel file, which he didn’t really know how to organize and just kind of put off for awhile… well we are just now looking at the HH again, and it’s pretty fucked up cuz Absolute gave Marco access to EVERYONE’s hole cards for the entire tourny, not just his or his tables but the entire field…
well it only takes a few hands to realize potripper could see the cards, but not what is coming on the flop/turn/riv… I was already 99% sure from seeing Marco’s hands and some HH’s other ppl had posted, but this is just unreal how he plays each hand… there is no way someone could bluff like he does and value bet like he does without being able to know what their opponents hold, it really is undeniable…”
Most players understand why Absolute has responded the way they did, it would be virtually company suicide to tell the public that either someone on the inside has compromised the site, or that someone on the outside has hacked the site and compromised it. Either way it would spark a huge pull-out of players funds as players would refuse to play there.
However, many top players are already pulling out their funds, and I would advise for anyone else to do the same. I will keep you updated with more updates as they come out.
-gank