Cheating in Online Poker

[uclabruinz]

I am going to write an article on cheating in online poker and am looking for any input that anyone has. I consider myself relatively uninformed at this point as to the shadier aspects of the game, but know that cheating runs rampant based on the comments in ActionJeff's post a couple weeks ago.

I have contacted Stars support, but they have been wildly inconsistent and generally disinterested both about specific aspects of cheating I have pointed out (e.g., buying several "idiots" into tournaments and taking over either literally or verbally if they get deep) and their policies in general, with are inconsistent with the statements being made by their support. I also feel they are very wrong about ethical standards in general with their "whatever is unenforceable is acceptable" line of reasoning.

So if anyone has specific input of any nature, please feel free to post it here, or to PM it to me. As many players who I suspect of cheating in one form or another based on their statements made here in this forum continue to show up deep in tournaments, the more motivated I am do something about it.

Steroids in baseball, doping in the Tour de France, refs on the take in the NBA. It's all over the place, and there's not much I can do about it, despite how much it disturbs me. However, I love this game of ours, this is my game, and I have hopes and goals within this game that are at least in part dependent upon the game flourishing and being fair. Please help me do what we can to make it that way in any way you are able to.

So let this thread not only be about what should go into an article about cheating in online poker, but what can be done by the community in general to prevent it.