Poker Bots - Are they a real Threat to Online Poker?
By: EMMA GILBERT

Concern is growing in online chat rooms and news groups devoted to poker that sophisticated card-playing robots – known as “bots” in the nomenclature of the Web – are being used on commercial gambling sites. The premise underlying online poker is that all players are humans. But with the growing availability of free poker "bot" downloads, it is becoming difficult to detect whether a player is real or a possibly unbeatable bot. Poker playing computer programs helps human players hone their skills, but now that researchers have made programs that claims they can beat any human player, are online poker sites under threat? Well because there's no real way to tell a program from a person. Some players could enter programs, or poker bots, as people. Ian Fellows of the University of California in San Diego (who make the Poker Bots) concludes "It wasn't until mid-2000, [when] an algorithm was developed, that [bots] could even come close to a competent player. But now online computer poker playing may become a thing of the past," said Fellows. Fell Omen is based on an artificial intelligence algorithm called "fictious play." The algorithm enables bots to use imperfect information. Unlike chess, for instance, players do not know what cards are held by other players. (In chess, all information is known to both players.) Normal game-tree searches like those used by chess-playing bots cannot be used for poker. Fell Omen "is all based on decision trees that tell you at any point in the course of the game, What's the probability you should raise, call or fold? Then it generates a random number and goes with that action," said Fellows. That strategy is combined with randomness that prevents other bots from guessing its strategy. But skeptics argue the complexities of the game and the changing strategies ensure that creation of a program that can “read” opponents’ cards using screen scanning techniques and respond in real time is years away at best. They point to the handful of commercial products that claim to give online players significant advantage, which they deride are inadequate, as proof today's bots are no match for humans. “It is pretty much a certainty that bots are playing online,” said Gautam Rao, a 43-year-old Canadian poker pro who regularly plays three high-stakes Internet games simultaneously. “… What we don’t know is how strong they are.” Widespread use of bots capable of beating your average player would pose a significant problem for the online poker sector, which has grown exponentially in recent years and is expected to top the $1 billion revenue mark this year. Without some way of verifying the identity – and humanity – of players, the business could be significantly undercut.

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