Poker News
Two time WSOP winner, and WPT winner Scott Clements won the PokerStars Sunday Million
Sunday 16th Dec Sun Mil Result
1. BigRiskky (Scott Clements) - $165,552 *
2. holdplz - $93,160 *
3. Carden72 - $95,984 *
4. PokerSkiBum - $54,152
5. joacb - $40,614
6. CrossyDC - $29,784
7. Rover10 - $20,984
8. maxit11 - $12,184
9. v1ckster - $7,987
* Payout reflects a three-way deal made at the final table.
News Item - 10th Dec 07 - Sunday Million
Sunday 9th Dec Sun Mil Result
1. CHIPFLOW - $182,396
2. Fjusse - $95,003
3. gbmantis (Nick Niergarth) - $68,367
4. rowang - $53,273
5. Tulkaz - $40,716
6. calmdwn1 - $29,173
7. gabrygabry - $20,929
8. squirtyb - $12,684
9. PimpJazzyJef - $7,864
News Item - 26th Nov 07 - Sunday Summary
The Sunday Million was a $530 entry this week, and attracted 2704 entrants. G0T T!LT? won the first prize of over $248,000. Not a bad achievement, considering they also finished 9th in the Sunday Mil last week!
Long term internet pro IWEARGOGGLES (Luke Staudenmaier) won the Sunday Mulligan on Full Tilt, taking home $142,154.95
News Item - 19th Nov 07 - Sunday Summary
PokerStars
The Sunday Warm-up attracted 2367 entrants at $215 a time, with whiskey lover Glenmorangie (Zuerich) taking down the $92K first prize.
The big one, The PokerStars Sunday Million had 6637 entrants with Balla-B13 taking the glory.
WPThero took down the Sunday Second Chance, attended by 1196 players.
sagwise won the $215 weekly HORSE event, attended by 72 players
The Sunday Hundred Grand (SHG) attracted 17513 entrants, with BoydStreet taking down 1st place
Full Tilt
FTOPS VI wrapped up this weekend following a very eventful series of tournaments
The big 2-day event on Full Tilt ($2620 buy-in) was won by wuddacooler, taking down $418,800
fkscreennames took down the FTOPS VI Main Event, good for $385,937.45
News Item - 9th Nov 07 - Latest Absolute Poker Statement
Interim Statement from Absolute Poker on Security Breach - Dated 8th Nov :-
As Former Grand Chief Joe Norton, the 100% owner of AP, previously stated, Absolute Poker will, when appropriate, issue periodic updates concerning the recent security breach in its system. Because the Kahnawake Gaming Commission's (KGC's) investigation is on-going, the information provided in this interim statement is subject to the completion of the final KCG inquiry. Gaming Associates (GA) is in the process of auditing AP's systems as part of the KGC inquiry. AP continues to cooperate fully with these investigations.
First and foremost, we would like to assure our players, once again, that the security breach, which resulted in unfair play, was resolved immediately after it was discovered and confirmed, and AP's sites are absolutely secure.
At this point, all players known to have been adversely impacted by the security breach have been fully reimbursed with interest. The amount that was illicitly 'won' by the illegitimate accounts was approximately US$800,000. The amount reimbursed to players by AP as a result of the security breach was approximately US$1,600,000.
Thus far, our internal audit has uncovered the following additional information:
The known period of unfair playing was approximately 40 days in length, beginning on 14 August 2007.
A known perpetrator was immediately terminated upon discovery of the scheme and no longer has access to AP. AP's internal investigation continues.
The system breach was the result of a recent internal software release impacting internal reporting. The breach was exploitable only by an authorized AP person that manipulated the internal reporting software, together with the AP gaming software. The security breach was not, therefore, the result of an external action, and no individual outside AP could exploit the breach.
There is no evidence of the current or past existence of a "super-user" account. There is no player account in the AP system with the ability to see other players' hole cards.
The names of the accounts known to have cheated are: potripper, graycat, steamroller, doubledrag, payup, supercard55, and romnaldo. These accounts have been closed. All players that played hands and lost funds during the period in question, against these accounts have received refunds, plus interest, for the net amounts lost.
All accounts associated with the perpetrating accounts are under investigation. If any other accounts are deemed to have engaged in illicit activities, AP will refund all affected players in the same manner.
AP can confirm that not every hand played by the perpetrating accounts during the said period was compromised by the tool enabling the unfair advantage. Nonetheless, AP has refunded players for the net loss resulting from every hand played against the perpetrating accounts during the affected period.
All hand histories with respect to the affected period were retained by AP and were made available to both the Kahnawake Gaming Commission and the internal auditor for detailed review.
All registered accounts in the AP database are under investigation to ensure that there are no other compromised accounts with links or associations to the closed accounts. If the on-going investigation determines that there are any further accounts that were used in connection with the unfair play, all affected players will be reimbursed in full, with interest.
AP regrets the damage that has been done to its players and to its own reputation by this incident. We are absolutely focused on doing the right thing for our loyal customers, employees, consultants, and business partners, and we will continue to work with KGC and Gaming Associates to bring this incident into the full light of day and to right any wrongs done to innocent victims of this unfair play.
Currently, thousands of people are playing on AP both for real money and for free. AP is a safe, secure and fun place to play poker.
End of Statement
To summarize some key things from the statement, It has been established that the breach took place over a period of 40 days. Absolute Poker has given out around $1.6 million to those directly and indirectly affected.
News Item - 9th Nov 07 - FTOPS Event 1 goes on hold
Due to some technical problems FTOPS VI Event 1 was paused mid-flow. Players were wondering what was happening, and in the end Full Tilt deciding the problems were taking too long to resolve and scheduling the rest of the tournament to resume and complete the following day. Not the best start to the FTOPS, but things can only get better, as they say.
News Item - 8th Nov 07 - Clements and Little join Full Tilt
Full Tilt Poker have signed two of the great young talents of poker Scott Clements, and Jon Little. When you add these to other recent additions of Jon Turner (PearlJammer) and Jared Hamby (TheWacoKidd), Full Tilt have a very impressive line up of the best new poker faces
News Item - 5th Nov 07 - High Stakes Poker - 500K Buy-in
Tonight we see the first episode of the 500K buy-in HSP cash game. It looks set to be a great series with some of the players scheduled to appear being Jamie Gold, Daniel Negreanu, Doyle Brunson, Sammy Farha, David Benyamine, Antonio Esfandiari, Barry Greenstein, and Patrik Antonius. It airs on GSN.
The 10K buy-in heads up game on Stars saw just 2 entrants this week, with buck21 taking on Genius28, with buck21 emerging the victor.
The Sunday Hundred Grand saw 18572 entrants, with bravo177 surviving the huge field to take down the win.
The Sunday Million was a $215 buy-in this week, and attracted 6398 entrants. WhatArunAA outlasted the field, but ironically took home around $99K (less than 2nd place) due to an earlier chop.
After holding the chip lead for 4 hours heads up, Annette Obrestad eventually sucumbed to PokerStars qualifier Reuben Peters. A great result for Annette, but I am sure she really wanted the title more than the money.
The final hand saw Annette with 7s 7h take on As Th
The board was Tc 6h 3d at the time. The 4c turn and 3h river were no help to Annette and Reuben Peters picked up the title.
Final Result
1st Reuben Peters €532,620
2nd Annette Obrestad €297,800
3rd Reijo Manninen €178,680
4th Trond Eidsvig €127,630
5th Daan Ruiter €105,510
6th Anders Pettersson €83,380
7th Michael Durrer €66,370
8th Thierry van den Berg €47,650
9th Casper Hansen €30,630
News Item - 1st Nov 07 - SlippyJacks
Last weeks Sunday Million winner SlippyJacks has admitting whelching on a previous stake agreement, after losing funds. He apologized for his previous bevaviour and paid his staker back (with interest!) following his recent Sunday Million win.
News Item - 30th Oct 07 - Absolute Poker Latest
October 24, 2007 Interim Statement
Absolute Poker (AP) today issued the following statement concerning the recent security breach in its system:
"Recently, AP was the victim of a breach of security in which a high-ranking consultant to the site devised a sophisticated scheme to manipulate internal systems and access third-party computers and accounts to view the hole cards of other customers during play and without their knowledge, resulting in unfair play. AP deeply regrets that this incident occurred and is committed to taking whatever steps are necessary to ensure the highest levels of security, privacy, trust and integrity throughout its entire system.
"Upon learning of the incident, AP immediately contacted Gaming Associates, an independent worldwide expert in audits, interactive gaming tests and information security, to undertake an internal investigation. Immediately thereafter, the Kahnawake Gaming Commission (KGC), AP's governing licensing authority, opened its own inquiry into the scheme. These investigations are active and on-going. AP is cooperating fully with the KGC investigation.
"The Company's internal investigation is ongoing, and its preliminary findings are subject to the final audit findings. Thus far, the Company's preliminary findings are as follows:
1. The perpetrator of the scheme was immediately terminated upon discovery and the case was turned over to the KGC.
2. AP has fully corrected the problem that allowed its system to be unfairly manipulated and is working to enhance its existing safeguards.
3. Since the initiation of the internal investigation, the databases have been locked down to ensure the integrity of the auditors' inquiry.
4. The scope of the audit will not be limited to a certain time period.
5. The suspected period of time of the security breach has been identified. This period is recent and confined to a relatively brief period. The actual dates will be publicly released upon confirmation by the third party auditor.
6. A thorough review of the game play has begun to identify all of the adversely affected players.
7. AP is committed to refunding 100% of the losses incurred by its affected customers. AP has begun the process of reimbursing its customers, and will continue to do so as quickly as possible until all customers are refunded in full.
8. Even after completion of this audit, AP intends to continue working with third party auditors and security firms to ensure that the highest level of game integrity is upheld.
9. AP is instituting strict guidelines to restrict its employees, consultants and contractors and members of their households from playing for money on its sites.
"These preliminary findings remain subject to its final audit. AP expects its internal inquiry to last for at least several weeks, and it will continue to cooperate with the KGC's investigation and to work with Gaming Associates until these outstanding investigations and inquiries are complete. AP will continue to issue interim statements related to its internal investigation as appropriate."
