Is online poker rigged?

Is online poker rigged?

The answer to this often asked question is much like any other answer you’ll receive about poker; it depends.

There have been several high profile cheating scandals exposed at what were considered ‘legit’ sites: Ultimate Bet and Absolute Poker (coincidentally owned by the same group!).


These incidents were only uncovered because the participants involved were beyond greedy; instead of using their insider information to have a never ending supply of money, they went after a really fast, and big, score. Kind of like stealing the Hope Diamond, sure it’s worth millions, but who are you going to sell it to?


Now imagine how much cheating goes undetected?

On the other hand, you need to understand where any serious cheating is going to happen; in the higher limits. If you are playing in games with buy-ins of a couple hundred dollars, you really have nothing to worry about. Any group that would cheat these limits isn’t going to be good enough at poker to exploit their advantage.


So fear not, unless you’re playing the nosebleed stakes there’s no need to start screaming, “ONLINE POKER IS RIGGED!” every time someone cracks your Aces with J4 off-suit: 99.99% of the time it’s because they are simply stupid, not because they’re cheating!

boston examiner

News Added: 18 November, 2008

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