Is Cheating Easier In an Online Casino?

How Do You Cheat at a Land-Based Casino?

There’s a bit of a grey area when it comes to what is technically considered cheating. The most common way to cheat at a brick-and-mortar casino, though many players just consider it strategy, is known as card counting. This is a mildly complex way to cheat, though it simply involves keeping track of how many cards worth ten have been burned in a game of Blackjack, and how roughly how many Aces and how many of certain numbers cards are left in the shoe. Beyond counting, some players even do edge sorting, where they take note of small flaws in a card, like a bent end, so that they know what the card is even when it’s facedown. Another way to cheat is to sit at a poker table with a friend and signal to each other about what cards you have in your hand. If both players are excellent, they can decide what the best move is based on the community cards and the cards in their hand, take as much money from the other players as possible, and then split the profit.

Back when Pokies were physical pull lever mechanical contraptions, it was possible to rig them if you knew what you were doing and had a bit of breathing room from casino oversight. When they became largely digitized, it made it impossible to rig them. However, some very tech savvy folks figured out a way to hack the actual computer and cause it to pay out, and while they have since put up large security measures to prevent this, it is presumably still possible to do it.

Cheating at an Online Casino

Since the shoe of the Blackjack game is reshuffled every time a new hand is dealt, counting cards is impossible at an online casino. And to consider edge sorting to be a viable option is laughable. However, it could be possible to enter and exit random real money poker rooms until you are matched up with your partner, and then coordinate with them to cheat the other poker players. In fact, if you manage to do it without the casino catching on, it would be a lot easier than at a land-based casino, because you could presumably just talk to them openly about your cards. In terms of making a Poker Machine pay out, or cheating the algorithms of the casino, it would pretty much only be accomplishable if you hacked into their servers, and at that point you might as well just steal the money and just ignore trying to beat any of the games.

The Consequences of Cheating

If you’re caught cheating at a land-based casino, you could be thrown out, have your winnings confiscated, and even become permanently banned. If you do something as outrageous as hack into one of the Pokies, you will probably face criminal charges, and if you are in the wrong casino at the wrong time, you might be subjected to a little punishment personally dealt out by the casino, though I’m basing that primarily on the movie Casino (1995) and other such films.

If you are caught cheating with another player in an online poker room, it is almost a guarantee that you will be permanently banned, and worse yet, your IP/personal information might be red flagged across many online casinos, which may make it difficult to find a reputable poker room to play in. If you hack into any company, online casino or otherwise, you might not get caught, but if you do, you’re almost guaranteed jail time and massive fines.

Alternative to Online Casino Cheating

Firstly, gambling should be seen as an entertainment option and a fun place to get some thrill. It should not be looked at as an investment opportunity or a quick way to make money. Rather than cheating, you could simply test your luck and hope for the best.

If you want to give yourself the best odds of winning online Blackjack, use a Blackjack chart. It tells you the mathematically best odds based on the value of your hand and what the Dealer is showing, including when to spilt, double down, and surrender, on top of when to hit or stay.