Slot Machine with Bad Software Sends Players To Jail 647
dcollins writes "Previous discussions here have turned into debates over who is liable for faulty software: the programmers, the publisher, etc. Yahoo has a new option: perhaps the users are criminally liable for using the software. From the AP: 'Prosecutors are considering criminal charges against casino gamblers who won big on a slot machine that had been installed with faulty software ... A decision on whether to bring criminal charges could come in a couple of weeks, said John Colin, chief deputy prosecutor for Harrison County. He said 'criminal intent' may be involved when people play a machine they know is faulty.' Would your average user be able to distinguish 'faulty software' from 'lucky'?"
I know blackjack is faulty and will abuse it (Score:3, Interesting)
Mixed feelings (Score:5, Interesting)
I have mixed feelings about this.
On the one hand, the casino should bear at least some of the responsibility for allowing a faulty machine to give away its money. I think it's entirely reasonable to expect them to inspect equipment for such glaring problems before installing it and letting the public have at it.
On the other hand, if a slot machine has the fact that it costs one dollar to play prominently displayed, and you get ten dollars' worth of credit when you insert your dollar, it's painfully obvious to any reasonable person that the machine is messed up. The people playing most certainly should have reported the error, or at the very least, not exploited it.
At the very least, I think the casino would--and should--have a very strong civil case against the people who exploited the bug and who didn't return the money. If the opposite happened, that people only got one dollar's worth of credit when they inserted a ten-dollar bill, you'd better believe there would have been hell to pay, and maybe even a lawsuit over it. Just because the error is in favor of the customer instead of the company doesn't shift the morality of the issue. As a matter of public relations, though, it might be in the casino's best interest not to push the issue, or to push the issue with the people who programmed the slots incorrectly instead of their paying customers.
As for criminal charges, although I think that exploiting the machines is a pretty scummy thing to do, I have a hard time thinking it should be escalated to the level of a crime. Like I said, the casino should bear some responsibility for the mistake. Even if exploiting the machine should be considered some sort of theft or cheating, what happened could be considered enticement to commit a crime that one wouldn't otherwise normally commit. That's entrapment, and that is illegal itself.
Re:I know blackjack is faulty and will abuse it (Score:3, Interesting)
(They really do still work cheaters over in the back room..)
Applies to gas too? (Score:5, Interesting)
Solomon
Yes and no. (Score:4, Interesting)
Think about it this way. In a bookstore or grocery the company is negligent if they put the wrong price on something and then let it be sold as such. However obtaining items under such situations do not result in criminal prosecutions. All that a Casino gives is the chance to win more than you pay, albeit a carefully rigged chance that is not in your favor. In this case they screwed up and gave too much of a chance. The fault here should lie with the Casino not the players. It was internal negligence not external. Proving a crime on the players' part seems a little odd of an interpretation to me.
Re:Applies to gas too? (Score:4, Interesting)
Possibly. Taking advantage of someone else's screwup can be viewed as an intent to defraud. That being said, the station would be more likely to simply ask you to pay the difference. (Assuming it was a big enough deal to make a stink about, which it probably isn't.)
According to the TFA, that's what the Casino did. They asked people who abused the machine to return the winnings they'd received. Some of them complied. Some of them didn't. Those that didn't are the ones who are being considered for criminal charges. It hasn't been decided yet if the state is going to pursue the case or not.
Even the editors don't RTFA (Score:4, Interesting)
When all the average Joe had to do was insert a dollar to get back $10 or $20, as in *no* game play at all, that's not "luck", that's "a stupid idiot who thinks he can rip off a casino".
If someone came up to a machine, and stuck a buck in and got back $10 without doing anything *or knowing the situation* and only did it once, I'd say the casino needs to suck it up and eat it.
But when people are lining up and (some of them) shoving $100 in to get $1000 out, that's not "luck" or "the way it goes", that's called "theft". And those who knowingly did it need to be knowingly prosecuted and knowingly be required to knowingly pay the piper.
Malfunction voids all plays and pays. (Score:5, Interesting)
!sympathy here.
Casinos win these battles all the time (Score:4, Interesting)
http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/17709 [networkworld.com]
Re:Mixed feelings (Score:5, Interesting)
Who said anything about the power to change the software? If you know the software is working incorrectly (which you do, if you get $10 credit for inserting $1), and you use that fact to exploit the machine for your financial gain at the expense of the casino, then you do bear responsibility for their loss.
Think of it this way. If you walk up to an ATM and withdraw $100, and it says on your receipt that your account has been reduced by $100, but the machine actually spit out $1,000, what do you do?
A. Report to the bank that their machine is screwed up and give them back the $900.
B. Keep the whole $1,000 and go your merry way.
C. Insert your card again and take $1,000 at a time until either your account or the ATM is empty.
Option A is clearly the right answer. If you pick option B, the bank will probably drop the issue if you give back the $900. If you choose option C, which is effectively what the people did in the casino, then it's pretty likely you'll find your ass in jail for theft, which is exactly where it should be.
Re:Applies to gas too? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm thinking if this *did* go to court, it would be pretty easy to settle out of court by offering to return the money THEN, vs. volunteering to give it away before it's even known if this is a case they're going to pursue.
I wouldn't normally advocate a purposeful attempt to keep money that's not rightfully yours - but as others have said, this is no ATM machine, designed to substitute for a human teller in a bank. This is a case of dumping money into a machine, supposedly for "entertainment purposes". The only reason you're giving the machine your money in the first place is with the hopes of getting more back out than you started with. It's the casino's job to control how often this actually works out for the player, and how often it doesn't.
If they installed a malfunctioning slot machine that was paying back $10 for every $1 inserted, I think the losses should really be THEIRS to eat. Eventually, these machines run out of money anyway, so there should be a maximum amount they could lose. (And if they were really STUPID enough to see the empty machine, have no record of it paying out a huge jackpot that would explain it being empty, and REFILLED it again
IMHO, it might make more sense to just send these players letters informing them that they're no longer welcome to play at their casino, unless they choose to voluntarily return the money. Let them decide if taking advantage of the opportunity is or isn't worth making it the LAST time they get to play there.
Re:Good grief (Score:3, Interesting)
So, you are basically saying that these people are guilty and have to prove they are innocent?
Seems to me if they have any first year law student, they would not say a word.
It seems to me that any decent lawyer would use any number of possible alternative explanations to shred every plaintiff witness that is called. Without calling the defendant to testify at all...
Which is the true key to this case -- it is impossible for the plaintiff to completely remove plausible doubt from all possible alternative explanations the defense could argue without examining the defendant... and the plaintiff cannot compel the defendant to testify.
It *should* be a non-starter.
Re:Good grief (Score:5, Interesting)
Ahem (Score:3, Interesting)
Really it's the Casinos loss. To bad, so sad. Thats the risk when introducing automatic systems that can fail.
Is it illegal? Hmmm. (Score:4, Interesting)
Did they repeatedly use the system or have knowledge of the problem before they put money into the system the first time?
If the answer to either of those two are yes then it's possible it's criminal intent and there's a case.
But allow me to raise another point Two situations arise. A. You go to the grocer's and you give a 5 to the cashier, who in turn gives you back a 20. Do you have to give this money back?
B. You go to an ATM. The ATM gives you a 50 instead of a 20. Do you have to give this money back?
Last I checked the answer is no to those, unless there's some sort of agreement between you and the bank/store which says any mistakes are decided in the store's favor and you must alert them of all mistakes. Which means if the players were playing and didn't realize the mistake, they shouldn't be required to give the money back.
the purpose of gambling (Score:3, Interesting)
So, let take this further. Let's say that by some random chance cards are arranged and a particular player wins every hand of blackjack. Should that player be prosecuted? Let's say that a roulette wheel is defective, and players take advantage of the wheel? Should those players be prosecuted? Let's say that the person running a craps table does not know the rules, and is letting people win. Do the player get prosecuted?
No, because gambling is all about random events. That yoou might get a card, that you might hit a jackpot, that the dice rolls right. The random even that you might get a broken machine. The gambling promoter, OTOH, tries to prevent random events that they can control. The broken machine, the incompetent employee, the card counter walking into their legitimate business. They have the right and responsibility to control those things, but as gambling is about chance, and it about losing and winning on the basis of chance, there is no way that a gambling promoter can complain when the customer does the same thing as the promoter.
Remember the successful gambling promoter controls the random variables as much as is possible so they the average rate of win is skewed toward the establishment. There is nothing wrong with this. But when the gambling promoter makes a mistakes, that is just like a retailer making a mistake. If a retailer accidently sells a product for an unreasonable low price, or gives a refund that is too high, or packs double merchandise, the customer might have a moral imperative to be nice and tell the merchant of the mistake, but certainly we do not send police to pick up the customer.And so why the person in this story might be morally wrong, I do not that any laws were broken. Especially considered that a slot machine is not like an ATM, where the behavior is predictable and a reasonable person knows or should know when it is broken. It is supposed to random. If someone magically starts winning, why they hell not should they think they are just lucky? I know people who time trips to casino once a month, and they come back with hundreds of dollars. They are playing the odds, which is perfectly legal.
Re:Gaming Practice and Law (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Good grief (Score:3, Interesting)
IANAL, but as I understand it (and I may be wrong, so be gentle if I am), the rules of stolen property basically state that if a "reasonable person" would conclude that the property is stolen, you knowingly received stolen property whether you claim you knew it was stolen or not. So if a guy offers to sell me a new BMW car for $500, a "reasonable person" would conclude that the car is stolen.
I think banks use a similar principle when they make a mistake. If your account goes from $1,000 to $100,000 and you didn't make any deposits, a "reasonable person" would conclude that the bank made a mistake and you don't get to keep that money. Of course, in the case of banks, there are agreements that you sign where you recognize this fact. Not so in a casino--at least not that I've ever seen.
So, it could argued, if the machine gave credit every time you put money in, a "reasonable person" would conclude that the machine is faulty and the money taken from the machine could be considered "stolen."
Response from a former slot machine engineer (Score:3, Interesting)
However, it is VERY difficult to test machines with real currency.
The levels of security, just at a slot machine company are enough to make you want to scream.
Everything you do that involves real money has to be checked, rechecked and then checked some more.
That is, unless you want to put your own money into the machine. I was never one to carry a stack of hundred dollar bills in my pocket just to test company owned machines.
Once you're on the floor of the casino, it's absolutely ridiculous. In most jurisdictions, just touching a machine (with a gaming license and an ID badge, mind you) requires calling security, waiting for them to reposition a camera on you and waiting for an armed guard.
Accessing any of the parts of the machine that are close to the money (most have an additional strong box around the currency acceptor, with seperate keys for everything), normally requires at least 2 guards and a floor person. It's nearly impossible to do any real testing of a machine on the floor.
I'll concede that the bill acceptors should have been checked LONG before the machines ever got the casino. That was a terrifically stupid mistake. But, not one that would have been easily discovered on the casino floor.
Finally, regarding liability. Because of an NDA, I can't mention who I used to work for. But, we did release a machine once that had a paytable bug. The average slot machine has several millions of possible draws. Our test lab was basically a casino floor, with oscillators rigged up to push the play button as fast as the machine could spin. We filled them up with large amounts ($100k+) of cash and left them spinning 24/7. We'd tested this release, on the whole lab, for several weeks. Unfortunately, we didn't ever hit the right section of the play sequence to trigger this bug. The particular bug was related to progressive payouts (those huge spinning dollar amounts above the machines). On our machine, there was only one combination that would award the progressive. Giving it about a 1/2,000,000 payout chance. The bug occured after a progressive hit and made future progressive wins more likely. We had one large casino call us after a particularly busy week. Our average was 1 progressive per month in this facility. They'd paid out 19 of them in a week. Additionally, our play volume was quite a bit higher then normal. After further examination, they found out that the people that had hit the progressives were related. We weren't ever sure if the people realized our paytable was borked or if they just thought they were lucky.
In the end, the casino paid the people and took it out of my former employer's hide.
I think that Johnny Law is just blowing some smoke to get his name in the paper. I can promise you who will end up paying for this mistake.
Casino Records .... yeah. (Score:3, Interesting)
"Vinnie, I keep telling you we can't say your wife's fur coat was lost in the slot machine. All these otha losses are OK, but the coat claim will have to go into the fire sale next month."
If it lets you do it ... (Score:3, Interesting)
I remember one FPS where there was a spot in one level where a player could walk through a wall and hide inside it and shoot anyone on the outside. This wasn't a game that had holographic walls or anything like that: it was an error in the level design. I racked up quite a few kills with that one until my friends caught on. At that point what had been a free-for-all turned into five-against-one.
It's all a matter of perspective, I guess.
Re:Good grief (Score:2, Interesting)
If I put in a dollar and got 10 credits, I would assume it was a 10 cent machine which had been labelled wrongly as a $1 one.
A "simple set of rules"?... (Score:5, Interesting)
Blackjack is a winnable game, but it is not "a simple set of rules" that will do it.
The rules you're referring to are called "Basic Strategy," which is a set of rules that will maximize your odds of winning in any given situation. All casinos I've ever been in allow you to actually keep Basic Strategy notes with you for reference. I've even seen them sold on cards in the gift shops of some casinos.
However, this set of rules will not give you an edge over the casino. All it does is lower the casino's edge over you.
The rules that will win at blackjack depend on counting cards. You have to keep track in your head of what's been played, at least in general terms of high cards vs. low cards. As low cards are played out of a shoe, the odds of the player winning go up, because high cards tend to bust dealer hands. The key is to bet more money when the shoe has a disproportionate number of high cards in it, and to bet less when the shoe has a normal distribution or when the shoe has a disproportionate number of low cards in it.
In some places such as Las Vegas, casinos have the legal right to bar players they suspect of counting cards. In others such as Atlantic City, they don't. In those places, casinos compensate by having dealers at tables with card counters shuffle the shoes much more often, sometimes after every single hand. By doing so, any advantage a card counter may have is negated, and the odds will always be in favor of the casino.
Obviously, pit bosses and security personnel in casinos are trained to spot card counters. The casino has computers itself that can analyze the odds of the player and casino at any point in a shoe, and if they see players vary their bets according to where those odds lie, they know they've got a counter on their hands and can ban them. Casinos have also been known to hire card counters to watch for betting variations of other counters and report them. Also, casinos maintain databases of known card counters so that professionals are instantly spotted and never even get a chance to play in their own favor.
But the set of rules to be a counter is not simple. In fact, most casinos actually LIKE it when people who think they can count cards come. The thing is, if you screw it up, you will lose a lot of money, because you'll be betting large amounts when the odds are not in your favor. Casinos get far more money from people who screw up card counting than they lose to people who can actually pull it off. For one thing, you're having to keep running counts of at least two numbers (more, if you want better odds) in your head. For another, you're actually having to play the game, and the guy sitting beside you at the table doesn't want to wait 30 seconds for you to decide whether to hit or stand after every card. For another, when you're trying to count cards, you're typically trying to do it in some non-obvious way so that if you're successful, you won't be banned or shuffled up on. It's hard to act all casual like you're not intensely concentrating on something when in reality you are. For yet another, casinos are by their nature very distracting places, with lots of commotion, yelling, dinging slot machines, and so on. As if that weren't enough, while you're at the tables, you'll have waitresses who are generally very attractive coming by repeatedly offering you free drinks, and counting cards while drunk is infinitely harder than counting them while sober.
Caesars lost money? (Score:5, Interesting)
Did they really "lose" money or did they just not make as much as they normally would have? Did the machine pay out during this time, or is it that players got to play 10x more per dollar, and therefore Caesars "lost" money?
Re:Good grief (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good grief (Score:5, Interesting)
In fact, I believe they do this on purpose as a psychological trick - you're losing points, you're not losing real money...
Re:Mixed feelings (Score:3, Interesting)
The slot machine says "Put some money in the slot, pull the lever, and you might win a whole lot more than you put in." Thus, a slot machine giving away money is doing exactly what it's designed to do.
An ATM says "Put in your card and PIN, and you can take out as much money as you have previously put in, no more". Thus, an ATM giving away money is obviously an error.
Re:Good grief (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Mixed feelings (Score:5, Interesting)
At the beginning of the school term I was usually dead broke. I would get my paycheck, put it into the ATM and then immediately withdraw the money ('cause I needed it for rent or tuition or something frivolous like that). When they put a hold on my check, the balance would never go below 0. And when they put the money back in, they would always deposit the whole amount.
So if I had $5.27 in my account (not unusual at the time
This actually happened to me frequently (I was always short of cash and since I was busy I always used the ATM to deposit my checks). Every time it happened I would go with my receipts and attempt to return the money. Every time they would say, "No, you are mistaken. Everything is fine".
This went on for 3 years. And finally they seemed to fix their bug. I have no idea how much money I ended up with, but it's not an exaggeration to say that the bank pretty much paid for my schooling.
I have to assume that since I presented the bank with my receipts that they knew about the problem and were just trying to do damage control by convincing me the problem didn't exist. So somewhere out there is a hugely dysfunctional software team, who took 3 years to fix a blatantly obvious bug. Whoever you are, I seriously owe you some beer
Re:Good grief (Score:5, Interesting)
Having some exposure to the gaming industry, ex-wife is professional poker dealer (just dealt the final table WSOP), and being a card counter myself, I have noticed that casinos, at least in small gambling communities, prefer card counters.
First of all, the courts have stated that casinos can only offer games of chance. If a casino wants to outlaw counting cards on the basis that card-counting pays the player, then, by definition, blackjack is not a game of chance and therefore cannot be offered by a casino.
Back to the point. Most blackjack players, quite frankly, suck, but think they are wizards. Every now and again, a good player walks into a casino, counts cards, tips well and keeps winning. What happens next? All of the gamblers walking by the table notice how "hot" the table is, sit down, and promptly empty their wallet.
One good, polite, well-tipping card counter will advertise the table, pay the dealers well and fill the house's coffers, while not costing the house much to pay the card counter.
More than one pit boss has approached me and asked how I was counting, and then asked if there was anything they could do for me -- food, drinks, etc.
Re:Good grief (Score:3, Interesting)
Displaying an item with a price tag isn't an offer to sell at that price but rather an invitation to negotiate terms. You offer to buy it at the marked price when you present it to the cashier - they have the legal right to decline to sell it to you at that price and/or make a counter offer. This is how it works from a contract law perspective anyway.
Many jurisdictions however impose criminal penalties for deliberately mispricing items to induce the sale - so a genuine mistake is ok - but a pattern of mislabelling prices will get you some scrutiny. It is also poor customer service to charge customers more than the marked price.
Re:Good grief (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Good grief (Score:3, Interesting)
While this does happen, most Las Vegas casinos have a much simpler policy:
They keep track of how each player is doing, and any player who is consistently winning is politely but firmly escorted out of the casino ("Sir, I think you've gambled enough for today"). Their picture is recorded, and players who do this multiple times are banned from returning.
They don't care how you do it or even if it's intentional - the reasons or methods have no effect on their bottom line. They just pick out the people who are getting too far ahead of the odds and remove them from the game. It is far simpler and more effective than any methods designed to detect or prevent specific actions.
Re:Good grief (Score:4, Interesting)
For every 1000 pulls:
1x 500-point payout
2x 100-point payouts
6x 25-point payouts
12x 10-point payouts
Total payouts: 970 points
Multiply the point totals by the dollar or cent amount of the slot machine and you have monetary totals.