Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

So my 57 year old mother last year started playing on Stars; just the 2 cent and 5 cent limit tables. According to her, she got an email the other day saying that her account had been suspended for security measures and that Stars support wanted her to send in some log files. After she complied, they told her that they believed she was using a bot, and that her account was being closed (although they let her cash out the little money that she had there.) When she showed me the emails from Jeff at Stars, I was as stunned as was she. The woman can't even spell "bot" let alone know what one is, nor where to find one. She's just a mom. Since I had corresponded once or twice with Lee Jones, I told her that I'd shoot him an email to ask him to personally look into it, which he did, and then sent her another email assuring her that Jeff had personally showed him the "evidence" and it was very damning, and that he was sure she was using a bot, and encouraged her to take her poker business elsewhere.

I know poker sites are very proprietary about their 'bot detection' procedures, as well they should be -- after all, I wouldn't want bot-makers knowing what procedures they have to evade. But this seems a little heavy-handed, no? They won't really tell her why the 'evidence' is so 'damning' -- she is just a hopelessly tech-retarded mom...I had to walk her step-by-step when she wanted to set up a free hotmail account. I tried explaining Pokertracker to her once, and she had no clue what I was talking about. I watched her play once, and she multi-tabled like 6 tables, but her eyes are so bad that she used the lowest screen resolution that only fits 1 table on the screen, so all 6 overlapped nearly completely, and she just acted whenever a screen would pop up, having no clue what the action had been in the hand to that point. It would have been very funny if it weren't my mom -- which made it kind of pathetic. I would stake my entire bankroll on her not doing anything untoward. At this point, it doesn't really matter, because Lee has told her that her business (small though I guess it was) is not welcome at Stars...I suppose it's just a little frightening to think of the implications for the rest of us...to one day wake up and be accused of running a bot when nothing of that sort was going on. Has anyone else been similarly falsely accused?

(I understand that people hear "mother"/"sister"/"brother"/"friend" and probably think something sinister e.g. gnoming is going on, especially in the wake of the ZeeJusting MTT multi-accounting scandal) but I assure you this is completely on the level. She is just a 57 year old mom who plays an hour or so of microlimit poker each day. She's never even played a tournament, that I know of, and I'm sure she's the only one logging on from her computer; in fact I don't think anyone else in the household even plays poker at all (I haven't lived with the parents in 10 years, and don't play when I visit their place.) I racked my brain to try and think of what on earth could have triggered a Stars investigation, but I'm drawing a complete blank. I know my post count on these forums doesn't mean all that much, but at least it might help give me a little credibility...the few people I met on the PPM cruise also might be able to vouch for the fact that I'm pretty normal.)

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Teddy,

This kind of stuff is unsettling at best. I grow weary with the implications of such a maneuver by Stars. Personally, I am high-limit player who never keeps more than a few k on any given site for reasons such as these. However, neteller going down would cause significant pain.

I would like to see some more details from Stars on this procedure. Basically, I want to make sure this doesn't happen to me.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Jeff was molested by robots as a child. He has a vendetta against anything bot related

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Yeah Caldarooni (we met v briefly on cruise, btw).
All I want is a little more info about it. If it can happen to my mom who is about as tech-retarded as they come, I hate to think that I'm just as vulnerable (if not moreso) b/c I actually use PokerTracker / PAH and the like.
The most baffling thing (to me at least) is how Jeff and Lee (who has always written me very clear and polite emails) can be so sure of it (reading his email, there is no doubt in his mind that he is 100% certain that she is using a bot...it's not like a "well gee, this looks suspicious, and we're going to close your account to stay on the safe side"...it was more like "who are you kidding - you are obviously using a bot...you're not welcome here anymore."
Like I said, I know virtually nothing about poker sites' bot detection procedures...but man, it sure would be nice to know what is returning a false positive...

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

After the cruise I was disappointed to learn you were onboard and we didn't meet. It doesn't surprise me though that we actually did - lots of faces and lots of drinking.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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I watched her play once, and she multi-tabled like 6 tables

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Was she still at the .02 and .05 cent limits when 6 tabling? I would be suspicious too...

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

I don't believe this story for one second.

Post the emails.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

This makes me want to make a Stars screen name and play like a bot just to see if I can be accused of this too. I would record all my play and send the video to Stars after they closed my account..I may try this in the future just to see what happens

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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I don't believe this story for one second.

Post the emails.

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You're an ass.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

I think that one of three things is possible:
1) Your mom accidentally installed bot software on her computer, which would be pretty damning evidence.
2) Your mom plays strictly "by-the-book" poker.
3) Your mom is made of old machine parts.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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I don't believe this story for one second.

Post the emails.

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You're an ass.

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Yes, I am. Moving past that...

What's the difference? If it's a true story, let's see the fake evidence that Stars is alleging against him.

I think he's not telling the whole truth. If he posts the emails in full with the disclosed evidence, then we'll be a lot closer to seeing the truth. If I'm wrong about him not telling the whole story, then I'll gladly eat crow, but I would be willing to bet $10,000 that I'm not.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

I'm certain Teddy wouldn't be intentionally leaving anything out of this story. He just wouldn't have posted if this was the case.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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I'm certain Teddy wouldn't be intentionally leaving anything out of this story. He just wouldn't have posted if this was the case.

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Either he isn't telling the whole truth that he knows of, or his mom isn't telling HIM the whole truth.

Do you really think PokerStars would throw someone off the site for being a bot just by playing "by-the-book" poker?

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Given the level of computer savvy you're describing, isn't it possible that something's been installed on her computer without her knowing it? Have you walked her through virus scans, adware, spybot, etc.?

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

[ QUOTE ]
I think that one of three things is possible:
1) Your mom accidentally installed bot software on her computer, which would be pretty damning evidence.
2) Your mom plays strictly "by-the-book" poker.
3) Your mom is made of old machine parts.

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Yeah, that first one is the only thing that even makes a shred of sense to me...e.g. maybe her machine got infected with a virus or trojan horse of some kind and whatever the malicious code in there is, it is setting off Stars' bot-detection trigger.

There is nothing more to this story than what I've written (although I admit that in the past, I have also posted replies to 'site xyz stole my money' posts that accuse the OP of not telling the whole story.)

My mom forwarded me the emails that Lee Jones wrote to her, so I could indeed post them, but I wasn't sure if that was appropriate: after all, he takes time to write back to her personally, not anticipating that someone is going to post them for a wider audience on 2p2...let me think about it...but the whole point is they don't give ANY evidence beyond "sorry, I checked out the situation myself, and Jeff convinced me that it's a bot, no doubt about it; case cloesd." Posting them here wouldn't give any new info -- it might just boost the story's credibility a bit, I guess. Tkae that for whatever it's worth; there really is nothing more to the story than what I posted.

(I am secretly hoping that Lee Jones might read this thread and choose to contribute; maybe he'll give us all some insight into the situation.)

EDIT: even if some people doubt the story, perhaps some of the people chiming in on this thread who have actually met me, albeit briefly, an vouch for me to some extent...seriously: i wouldn't have wasted my time or anyone else's posting half-truths.)

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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I'm certain Teddy wouldn't be intentionally leaving anything out of this story. He just wouldn't have posted if this was the case.

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Either he isn't telling the whole truth that he knows of, or his mom isn't telling HIM the whole truth.

Do you really think PokerStars would throw someone off the site for being a bot just by playing "by-the-book" poker?

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Not at all, I call some sort of trojan.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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Not at all, I call some sort of trojan.

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Very possible. In which case, his mom's not telling him the whole truth (even if they are both unaware of it).

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

ok, i'm just waiting for the joke having to do w/ teddy's mom and trojan condoms at this point

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Have you checked the computer for bots/trojans, running adaware and virus software?

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Here's 99% likely what happened.

Your mom was surfing the internet looking for poker tips. She ran across one of those "see your opponents' hole cards!" sites and accidentally downloaded something that set off the flags.

That combined with the fact that she's 6-tabling nanolimits (wtf, btw?) must be what they're looking at.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

It's a little late for April fool's, so hmmmmmm...

This is really weird. As others have mentioned, the only logical answer is that yr mom either has something crazy on her computer. It might be a virus or worm of some sort that tries to hack into Stars -- but I'm pulling this straight out of my ass as I don't know how possible that is.

Perhaps she accidentally DL'd some poker bot while Googling something about poker. Like "Win Hold'em" maybe? She clicked on the first thing she saw and accidentally downloaded something? I know it's wild speculation, but if yr mom is as computer illiterate as you say, it is a plausible longshot.

The only other thing I can think of is that Stars got a little trigger happy with suspicion with someone multi-tabling nano-limit games. "Why would someone savy enough to multi-table play nano games? They MUST be testing a bot!" I would like to think more of Stars than that.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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Here's 99% likely what happened.

Your mom was surfing the internet looking for poker tips. She ran across one of those "see your opponents' hole cards!" sites and accidentally downloaded something that set off the flags.

That combined with the fact that she's 6-tabling nanolimits (wtf, btw?) must be what they're looking at.

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Ha! You beat me to it!

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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Posts: 1567

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EDIT: even if some people doubt the story, perhaps some of the people chiming in on this thread who have actually met me, albeit briefly, an vouch for me to some extent...seriously: i wouldn't have wasted my time or anyone else's posting half-truths.)

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no [censored].

Anyone who thinks that seriously needs a reality check.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

This is pretty frightening. They wont give you a reasonable proof for closing the account but are certain that your mom is botting the micro limits..

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Am i going to be the first one here questioning this story? Who here has a mom that first plays poker and second multitables.

I don't think stars pulled this out of their arse.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Okay here's what I think happened:

1. You mom somehow got to multi-tabling, but instead of knowing the game or whatever, she simply clicked buttons without any thought to her cards or previous action in the hand at all. This could be seen as a bot with seemingly random actions (that "thought" for the same amount of time everytime since there was no actual thinking involved - kinda like playing a slot machine).

2. (Much more likely) her account or computer has been compromised and someone else was doing this "botting" through her computer or another on her account. Computer Illiterate people + monetary transactions on the computer = trouble. They are sitting ducks for phishers, trojans, backdoors, etc.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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I don't believe this story for one second.

Post the emails.

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Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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Am i going to be the first one here questioning this story? Who here has a mom that first plays poker and second multitables.

I don't think stars pulled this out of their arse.

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6-tabling $1/$2 limit I might understand but for a recreational player to do this at the .02 cent tables is just so unbelievable to me.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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Am i going to be the first one here questioning this story? Who here has a mom that first plays poker and second multitables.

I don't think stars pulled this out of their arse.

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My mom plays poker. Its sick.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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Am i going to be the first one here questioning this story? Who here has a mom that first plays poker and second multitables.

I don't think stars pulled this out of their arse.

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.
6-tabling $1/$2 limit I might understand but for a recreational player to do this at the .02 cent tables is just so unbelievable to me.

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I have a hard time imagining anyone, especially a 57-year old mother, would even enjoy 6-tabling nanolimit poker. In fact, that may actually be my personal hell.

I don't know what really happened, but I would also bet a large amount of money that we aren't getting the whole story.

Even the trojan theory is a big stretch to me. Either the mom was screwing around with something she shouldn't have been screwing with, or ... something worse.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Here's what really happened to me that might also happen to her but instead at Party.

One day I was playing part by 3-5 months ago and suddendly out of the blue a screen pops up asking to type in this word to verify i'm human. It's one of those things that you have to type in to make sure a bot isn't doing it. Like the stuff you need to type in when registering for emails or forums.

So my guess is she probably got that at STARS, and with the computer skills that you siad she has, she wasn't able to type it in time

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Yeah... why would any 57 year old woman enjoy randomly pushing buttons as fast as possible with absolutely no thinking involved, just so that she can occassionally win small amounts of money which allows her to continue pushing buttons until it all runs out?

btw, ever seen the inside of a casino?

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Not that Teddy has done anything wrong...but I imagine this would fit into the scenario of someone designing a bot.

They are a decent poker player; they play online themselves. Plus, they have some computer saavy, so they design a program. Not wanting to compromise their situation, as they are doing well beating the games "straight up," they decide to give it a whirl at moms house on the microlimits.

Now "mom" is 6 tabling the .01/02 or whatever, red flags, good job pokerstars.

CREATE A NEW ACCOUNT!!! DUH!!!!
 

Um its so easy. Use a new e mail, physical address, phone #, CLEAN computer, ect... its easy as 123!!

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

Just doing seemingly random things triggered this? They'd have to ban everyone who plays any type of microlimits.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

I'm anxiously awaiting these emails! If this is true I might never play at stars again [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

I met Teddy on the cruise and he seems as perfectly abnormal as anyyone else. I have no reason to doubt he's making this up.


However, I too would like to see the e-mails just out of curiousity.


FWIW - I had a couple of e-mails with mike O'Malley and I asked if it was okay if I posted the e-mails on 2+2 and he said that as a public represntative of Party he anticipates that this is always a possibility so he has no problem with it.
Sopmething like that anyway.


If Stars banned her account and won't give you specific reasons then I see no reason why it would be inappropriate to post the e-mails they sent you.
As long as it's okay with your Mom then you should do it.
If Stars doesn't llke it then that's their problem. But I don't believe they have any real cause to have an issue with it unless they otherwise say so ahead of time.


If it's really uncomfortable then send an e-mail to stars support asking if it's okay to post their responses in the 2+2 thread.

Also, send an e-mail to Lee directing him to this thread. Much better chance of him seeing the discussion about it then just 'hoping' he happens upon it.

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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I met Teddy on the cruise and he seems as perfectly abnormal as anyyone else. I have no reason to doubt he's making this up.

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lol nh

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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I have no reason to doubt he's making this up.

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He was a shady character then?

Re: Stars catches a bot and it\'s........my mom
 

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Yeah... why would any 57 year old woman enjoy randomly pushing buttons as fast as possible with absolutely no thinking involved, just so that she can occassionally win small amounts of money which allows her to continue pushing buttons until it all runs out?

btw, ever seen the inside of a casino?

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NH