UltimateBet.com Investigation Comes To An End

Canada's Kahnawake Gaming Commission (KGC) licensing authority has announced the completion of its investigation into last year’s cheating scandal involving leading online poker site UltimateBet.com.

As part of the investigation, the Quebec jurisdiction has made public the 23 accounts and 117 usernames used by cheaters and stated that the method for determining the list of names was approved by its forensic auditors.

The KGC stated that Tokwiro Enterprises ENRG, the parent company of UltimateBet.com, had met all of its conditions and had shown adequate cause as to why its Client Provider Authorisation should not be revoked. The KGC concluded that Tokwiro was not aware of the deficiencies in its control system until after the cheating activity had been initiated and stated that the operator had fully cooperated with its investigation.

For its part, Tokwiro announced that no individual identified as ‘unsuitable’ is currently involved in any aspect of its ownership, management or operations and that it had ensured that all players victimised during the cheating activity had been promptly and fully reimbursed. In addition, the firm paid a fine of $1.5 million to the KGC while also covering the costs of the investigation.

“The welfare of our players is our top priority and we are very pleased they now have access to the details of the fraud and all the facts and findings released by the KGC included in its report,” said Paul Leggett, Chief Operating Officer for Tokwiro.

“A lot of our players have been patiently awaiting the release of the full list of usernames involved in the cheating incidences and we can now answer any of their outstanding inquiries related to their refunds.”

Tokwiro revealed that the software that allowed the cheating to take place, which is no longer in use, historically permitted a username to be reused so long as it was no longer associated with an account. It stated that this means that it is possible that ‘some of the usernames that were released yesterday by the KGC may have been used by legitimate accounts once those usernames were no longer used and controlled by the perpetrator’. The Canadian firm also stated that it was possible that ‘a very small number of the usernames associated with the cheating accounts never actually played a hand’.

A full list of the accounts and usernames used by cheaters can be found at Kahnawake.com/GamingCommission/kgc091109b.pdf while Tokwiro stated that players with questions regarding the cheating incidences may e-mail UltimateBet.com’s around-the-clock support service at PokerSecurity@UltimateBet.com or telephone 1-888-200-2933.

“It is extremely important to us that our players and the rest of the poker community understand that the individuals who perpetrated the cheating have never had any involvement with our company and we hope that the KGC report helps to inform the poker community of this fact,” said Leggett.

“Over the past year, we have literally rebuilt our company, creating a new management team and core staff that are poker players themselves and passionate about the game and we are very excited to demonstrate what we can do in the coming months.”