UltimateBet Admits to Cheating Scandal

June 2 - A Kahnwake-licensed online poker site has again come under fire in an alleged cheating scandal, after players became aware of software glitches and charged the management of Ultimate Bet with tampering with the internal software.

The case first came to light after players on the popular poker forum twoplustwo.com began to analyze irregularities coming out of UltimateBet, one of the more popular online poker sites in the industry. It was found on the forum that one of the cheaters had managed to win $600,000 in the space of four months.

On Thursday, UltimateBet, owned by Kahnawake grand chief Joe Norton through his company, Tokwiro, was forced to make a statement through the site, admitting that software had indeed been tampered with, allowing insiders to see poker players' hidden cards during games.

"The individuals responsible were found to have worked for the previous ownership of UltimateBet prior to the sale of the business to Tokwiro," said that statement. "Tokwiro is taking full responsibility for this situation and will immediately begin refunding UltimateBet customers for any losses that were incurred as a result of unfair play."

The statement did not name the suspected cheaters, nor did it disclose how much money was won fraudulently. Experts in the industry agree however, that the amount could run into millions of dollars. However, the site did reveal that the software glitch had been in place for at least fifteen months.

According to UltimateBet, six player accounts were identified to having taken part in the cheating scandal, using 18 different aliases. UltimateBet claimed that the security hole, as it called the problem, had been plugged and promised to ban all cheating individuals and increase security on the site.

Surprisingly (or perhaps not so), the first cheating scandal that affected the online poker industry involved AbsolutePoker, another Kahnawake-licensed site, also owned by Tokwiro. AbsolutePoker was fined $500,000 by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission, which was created when Joe Norton, owner of Tokwiro, was chief of the self-governing territory in Canada.