After allegations earlier this year that cheating had taken place on the UltimateBet online poker website, owners of the site Tokwiro Enterprises have finally issued a statement on the debacle.

The statement recognises that certain accounts had an unfair advantage and these accounts targeted the highest limit games on the site.  These accounts belonged to former workers of UltimateBet who were employed before Tokwiro’s takeover of the site in 2006.  These individuals have yet to be named.

The allegations of cheating began in January when a user named “NioNio” was suspected by other players of irregular play.  An investigation found out that six accounts had in fact been involved in cheating and these account names were changed frequently by the perpetrators to try to cover up their cheating.

The company statement acknowledges that the cheating was enabled by “unauthorised software code” allowing the fraudsters access to hole card information during live play.  Tokwiro claim they were unaware of this bug in the system until February of this year and that it had existed before the sale of UltimateBet to Tokwiro in October 2006.

Part of the statement reads, “Our investigation has confirmed that the code was part of a legacy auditing system that was manipulated by the perpetrators.”  It continues by claiming the malicious software has been removed, “Gaming associates, independent auditors hired by the KGC, have confirmed that the software code that provided the unfair advantage has been permanently removed.”

The scam bears an extraordinary resemblance to the one that happened on the Absolute Poker site which is also owned by Tokwiro Enterprises.  On that site, fraudsters were also able to view other players’ hole card information whilst playing.  This was again an inside job as the perpetrators were ex-employees of Absolute Poker.

In addition to removing the software code and banning the accounts involved in the scam, UltimateBet have claimed they will refund accounts affected by the cheating.  They will also take action to prevent any such loopholes being exploited in the future.

The statement asserts, “We would like to thank our customers for their patience, loyalty and support, as well as for their understanding that we are doing everything we can to correct this situation.  The staff and management of UltimateBet are fully committed to providing a safe and secure environment for our players, and we want to assure customers of our unwavering resolve to monitor site security with every resource at our disposal.”

However, just like with the Absolute Poker case, many online poker players on community website 2+2 have not been pleased with the way Tokwiro took their time in dealing with the issue. 

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