For the majority of the States of America, online poker operates in a quasi-legal (or illegal) stasis. People in these states have offshore options, which can be a bit on the iffy side (and we here at Poker News Daily encourage ANYONE to do their due diligence when it comes to playing online on these sites). One of those sites that have been able to do an excellent job over the years is ACR Poker (formerly America’s Cardroom), which has recently updated its software that puts bans in place for certain activities.
ACR Poker Bans Virtual Machines, Remote Viewing
According to a press release from the Costa Rica-based operation, their latest update for the software of the site will prohibit the players from doing a few things that were allowable in the past. The usage of “virtual machines” is one new prohibition on the page, which a second deals with the ability to share screens through remote viewing tools that are available for computer users. These two changes went into effect on Friday, meaning that ACR Poker no longer allows for this type of usage in combination with running ACR Poker.
For those who violate the new rules, there will be a bit of a “grace period” before any punishments are implemented. For the first time, players will receive a warning from ACR Poker that they violate the new rules. Any subsequent violations can result in anything from account suspensions to confiscation of funds and banishment from the site.
It is the rules on remote viewing that might be the most impactful. These tools can be used in a completely innocent setting, as a way that a player may train for poker with a coach, but that is even verboten under the new rules. ACR Poker’s thoughts on this are that the loss of ability to get coaching is a fair tradeoff to prevent players from being able to employ someone to help them play a particular tournament or cash game, where they might profit handsomely (the “one player to a hand” rule of poker).
Why Did the New Rules Come About?
The new rules have come due to an investigation that uncovered nefarious activities on the ACR Poker software. Information from players showed that there were “coordinated violations” of ACR’s Terms of Service (TOS). As a result of this investigation, eight accounts were banned from ACR access and 25 other accounts that demonstrated “ties” to those eight banned accounts were also ejected from the ACR club.
ACR also quickly addressed how these banishments – and the money involved – would be handled. A total of $184,000 was reallocated to the players affected by the banned accounts and tournament results were corrected to reflect the removal of those now-banned accounts. “I’m sad that we have to engage in this high-tech game of ‘Whack-a-Mole,’ but it’s important for us to try to stay ahead of the bad guys,” Chris Moneymaker, the ACR Poker Pro and face for the site, commented during the announcement. “I’ve been playing online poker for more than twenty years now and, just as the cheaters get more sophisticated, so have the poker rooms. ACR invests heavily in technology and people to deliver as fair a game as any of the major sites.”
The pursuit of online poker cheaters is something that all poker rooms, whether they are located in the international realm or are serving U. S. customers, should be diligent about. Kudos to ACR Poker for keeping this in mind and being quick to respond when presented with evidence of wrongdoing.
Notice that he said “as fair a game as any of the major sites” and not “as fair a game as possible” :)