The superuser scandal on UltimateBet (now UB.com) and Absolute Poker that rocked the online poker world just won’t die.

A new round of accusations, information and reports has surfaced; here’s a look at what’s happened in recent weeks. Standard caveat: Very little of this situation is absolutely verifiable, so treat much, if not all, of it as speculation (albeit very educated speculation in places).

If you’re familiar with the background, skip to the new stuff.

Some Background

Before getting into recent developments, here’s a summary of the superuser scandals at the two online poker sites.

In the fall of 2007, several accounts playing high-stakes games had drawn suspicion at Absolute Poker. Despite playing against conventional strategy, several accounts were crushing high-stakes limit hold’em cash games, well beyond what could be accounted for by statistical variance. Many of the people looking into the case believed the accounts could see their opponents’ hole cards, despite AP’s assurances to the contrary.

The break in the case came when a user who had seen a thread at twoplustwo.com about the alleged “superusers” came forward about his experience during a $1,000 buy-in tournament, in which he was suspicious of the play of the tournament’s winner — “POTRIPPER.” The player had requested a hand history from AP, in which the hole cards of all the players were revealed. It was now obvious that a superuser who could see his opponents’ cards did exist.

Soon thereafter, online poker players and 2+2 members began linking the evidence that had been uncovered at Absolute Poker to suspicious activity at UltimateBet. Namely, that an account named “nionio” was winning at cash games at an extremely high rate despite non-optimal play. Eventually, it came out that the name of the account, which according to statistical analysis and hand history reviews was a superuser, was changed by UltimateBet, despite the red flags associated with the account. A total of 10 accounts were linked to nionio and suspicious activity at UltimateBet, and millions of dollars were believed to be earned by these accounts via cheating.

Eventually UltimateBet’s parent company Tokwiro Enterprises, admitted to the fact that superuser scandals existed. Their statement here. Later, evidence implicating UltimateBet executive Russ Hamilton and Absolute Poker co-founder Scott Tom surfaced.

For a more detailed summation, you can read this 2+2 thread that breaks it all down with a lot more detail. Or you can watch a 60 Minutes report, if you didn’t see it the first time around:

Recent Developments

Travis Makar Speaks

Information about the superuser scandal continued to trickle out over the years — like a report from poker reporter/blogger Haley Hintze that implicated Tom more than previously thought — since the original cheating occurred.

But a new wave of news started in February. It began when Travis Makar — who was often linked to the superuser scandal and described as “working with” Hamilton — did an interview with DonkDown Radio. (You can read or listen to the entire interview here.)

Makar said on the show that he is in possession of incriminating evidence, but he cannot release it because of legal concerns. From the interview, it sounds like the evidence that has come out — which is both substantial and damning — is but a small piece of the picture of what happened behind the scenes regarding the superuser scandals at Absolute Poker and UltimateBet. An excerpt from the transcript at the DonkDown forums (“Micon” is Bryan Micon, a poker player and one of the show’s hosts):

Micon: Sure. So there’s a, there’s a…you said that you can’t give us that information because of charges that have been brought, but then, well Russ, of course, it doesn’t appear that any charges have been filed on this matter, though. Makar: The problem is is that with certain documentation that I have, it falls under federal laws and they are determining whether or not they want to go federal with it and I would then, you know, be liable to testify because I have the evidence. And how I obtained the evidence. So, it’s, it’s…again I can’t get into too much detail. That’s, you know, really between me and my attorney, it’s just I finally got fed up with it. I went to the attorneys, talked to them, showed them what I had. Um, and, again, like I said, these people that are so smart, that were able to do all of this stuff, were just dumb. They left evidence laying all over the place. I mean, there’s people in Costa Rica that were scamming the company. There’s, you know… It just goes on and on and on.

In the interview, Makar also talked about the alleged extortion of UB, which was linked to a 2+2 account named “brainwashdodo.” And he talked more about the evidence in his possession; more excerpts below (Paul Leggett is the chief operating officer of UB.com):

Makar: Yeah, yeah, Paul Leggett. That’s it. Yeah, Paul Leggett. So, basically, um, Mook, or uh – I’m sorry Mookman, uh, he – I was going to say the guy’s real name even too – um, Brainwashdodo basically was blackmailing Paul Leggett, and Paul Leggett would only agree to pay a certain amount of money to keep the data quiet. Micon: Well, they probably got the deal done. Makar: He then at that point decided that wasn’t enough money and he didn’t really know who to contact so he just put some of the information out there on the internet figuring he’d grab some attention. And when he grabbed enough people’s attention, some of the highers up, then, you know, paid attention and contacted him. Micon: According to Haley Hintze, it was, Brainwashdodo was paid $80,000, according to Haley Hintze. Makar: No. Uh, that was what he was offered from Paul. I’ve got that e-mail too. Druff: So he got more than $80,000? Micon: Oh my god. Makar: Oh, yeah, yeah. A lot more. He was given, he… Paul offered him $80,000, which I have the actual e-mail that he sent to Brainwashdodo offering him the $80,000. It wasn’t enough. He wanted more. Micon: So, Travis, you have the treasure trove of UB. You have the Holy Grail of like e-mails and… Makar: I even have the machines. Micon: [laughs] Makar: I have the machines that were used to do this.

Whole thing here

Later Micon said that he saw some of the evidence that Makar had in his possession, and said it was indeed the “holy grail” of documentation on the superuser scandal. You can read about that meeting here.

Reaction to Makar

The interview with Makar created a new flurry of activity, including some new posts by Hintze, one of the biggest forces behind the uncovering of the superuser scandal. Having seen the transcript of the Makar interview, it gave her independent confirmation of information in her possession about the alleged extortionist, “brainwashdodo.”

First, she identified “brainwashdodo” in a post here. She says that the person who allegedly extorting UB/AP was Zoltan Rozsa, a Hungarian believed to be a former customer service representative at AP. An excerpt from her blog:

Now on to the real dirty stuff. When the cheating scandals broke, Rozsa somehow came into possession of many incriminating documents, though I now know he was far from the only one to do so. A lot of people were (rightfully) interested in covering their own ass, and a lot of people are still sitting on caches of important information. Rozsa was not, to my knowledge, the only customer-service rep to make copies of suspicious activity, and of course many of the bigger names already linked to the scandal had their own reasons to save things as well. But unlike many of the others, Rosza at some point decided to make use of his knowledge for personal profit.

You can also read the e-mails in Hintze’s possession here.

Travis Makar is no Saint

While Makar’s appearance seemingly out of nowhere was hailed by many as a way to get closer to the truth in the superuser scandals, not everyone was so sure. About a week after the interview, this blog post went up at CardRunners from instructor spartanfox. Excerpt:

Then, there is Travis himself. I’m gonna split this into two seperate categories: he’s full of shit, or he’s not: – Full of shit: My money was initially on this one. He was Russ’s assistant, and Russ recently has been getting an unbelieveable (but warranted) amount of flak for even being in a poker room on this planet. Why not just spread some rumor on a show that will readily spread it for you that Russ wasnt all that bad and there are unseen forces that have been pulling the wool over their eyes for years? Seems pretty simple to me, and hell I could fabricate emails to that effect if I was in Russ’s employ, I’d know exactly what to do. As time has got on I have decreased (but not eliminated) this as a result for the whole mess and instead have gone with: – Not full of shit, but definitely shady: The alternative theory is he has bailed on Russ and is presently having money issues. Regardless of his “road rage” incident in Utah, he has been very slowly leaking information to Donkdown in a fashion meant to scare the shit out of people that may actually have a reason to have the shit scared out of them. I have credited the UB scandal to gross incompetence, but hell I could be wrong, and I won’t say that’s not possible. But there is no way Travis Makar is doing this out of guilt or the kindness of his own heart. He might not be a poker player, but he’s trying to bluff that fact pretty hard. No, I really think he’s trying to get someone to spring some cash to shut him up. And what better way than to, again, go on the one show that won’t ask him any hard questions and eat up every piece of (in this scenario factual) evidence he provides until someone pays up/cracks?

Read the whole thing.

Leggett Responds

UB COO Leggett, after this firestorm of information, much of it mentioning him as directly involved in a potential cover-up, decided to put up a blog post about all the developments. You can read that here. From the post:

Firstly, I want to make sure everyone knows that I never made an offer to pay-off Brainwashdodo and I never did pay or instruct any payment to be made to Brainwashdodo. It is true that he tried to blackmail our company by threatening to release a bunch of confidential company information including financial records and player data. However, after unsuccessfully trying to pursue him with the help of local law enforcement, I simply told him that I was unwilling to pay anything to him.

Poker Community Reaction

There has been no shortage of opinions in the online poker community in the wake of all this news. Perhaps the strongest statement came from PokerStars pro Daniel Negreanu in his blog:

None of the Makar interview surprised me very much and I expect more dirt to be revealed in the coming months. Needless to say, UB is a corrupt company and your money is not safe with them. With so many places to play online poker, the UB/AP network is one you should scratch off your list unless you want to be the next victim. I wish more players would speak out against this company that is a black mark on our industry, but as a wise man once said, “Stand up for what’s right, even if that means you are standing alone.” The public deserves to know and we should not sweep this stuff under the rug and pretend everything is on the up and up over there.

Whole post here.

And there was even a tweet from Tom “durrrr” Dwan: “I think I agree with daniel if I had to bet about ub, but I’m not as sure as he is. Wouldn’t play there myself atm w/o researching 2p2 a bit”

What’s Next?

—What’s the end game for Makar?: Does he really want the truth to come out? Is he just try to get some hush money out of someone? Will we ever learn everything he knows, and see proof of it? Only time will tell.

—More reporting: Hintze continues to report/release information on the scandal. If you want to keep up with her blogging, go here and subscribe.

—Do people keep playing at UB?: Despite all the information that has come out over the years — and in the last month — players still don’t stay away from UB/Absolute. They aren’t going to challenge PokerStars or Full Tilt anytime soon, but they are still among the largest online poker rooms. Is there anything that can come out that damages them beyond repair, at this point?

—Will anyone make a video about UB as funny as this one?