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Man steals $33 million from Australian casino in 'Ocean's Eleven'-esque heist
- antidaily 14y agoSo he won by cheating at the tables? Was not expecting that from headline.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- taude 14y agoAlways love a good heist story.
- shocks 14y agoThis is my favourite article on heists: http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/03/ff_masterthief_blanchard/ http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/03/ff_masterthief_blancha...
- CamperBob2 14y agoYeah, great story. There but for the grace of $DEITY went Woz.
- taude 14y agoThanks, adding that to my reading list.
- sbarre 14y agoSo they article is assuming or speculating that someone basically tapped into the video feeds for the casino surveillance? I would have assumed the camera feeds would be wired, but I guess maybe for ease of maintenance they're wireless feeds? If they're just using run of the mill Wi-Fi cameras, then I suppose they get what they deserve..
- BryanB55 14y agoI really doubt they had wireless wi-fi cameras. Any decent installer would never do that for such a large establishment with that many cameras. In fact, it would probably be more maintenance because they are not as reliable. It would be interesting to see how he got the feed but I really doubt they had wireless cameras in a casino.
- sbarre 14y agoYeah after reading some other articles, it really does sound like someone on the inside gave them access to the security system, as opposed to them hacking into it without help.
- CamperBob2 14y agoHmm. They could still have used a wireless methodology. Somewhere there is a room with a lot of monitors for those cameras, where the security personnel watch the tables. That room is probably not exactly hardened to TEMPEST standards.
- smoyer 14y agoThe whole reason casinos stay in business is because the house "skims" money from the players ... or in games where the player plays against the house, the house has more favorable odds. The head-line says "steals", but the reality is that he was simply cheating. One is a crime but I'm not sure about the other. If I'm accomplished at counting cards, I can still beat the house because I've changed the odds. The casino may ban me (and I might forfeit the earnings for the day) but they can't charge me with a crime.
- mistercow 14y agoIf by "crime" you mean "against the law", then yes, cheating is a crime, but it depends on the jurisdiction. Depending on how silly and/or archaic the laws in the jurisdiction are, just intercepting the surveillance signal might be a crime. >The casino may ban me (and I might forfeit the earnings for the day) but they can't charge me with a crime Counting cards has apparently been explicitly ruled not to be cheating in Canada, and while casinos generally call it that, it is not actually illegal. Other forms of cheating are, however. For example, in Nevada, cheating is a felony.
- aprescott 14y agoNot only that, in Ocean's Eleven they don't just place bets, they break into a vault, so the only similarity with the film seems to be that a camera feed was involved.
- robomartin 14y agoOne aspect of the ilegality, if you will, of card counting I don't yet understand is the fundamental idea behind it: using your brain to make intellectually sound batting choices is not legal. I know the casinos would rather have people turn their brains down to "idiot mode" when they play. However, I can't understand why the law supports the idea that I am not allowed to use my brain, memory and deductive reasoning skills when playing. Weird, I don't get it.
- andyakb 14y agoIn the US, and likely most countries, card counting is not illegal. However, casinos can refuse to do business with anybody they want, so they can ban you for it. The exception is Atlantic City where you can't be banned for card counting, but if you are suspected of it, they will use other tactics to negate any advantage you may have (e.g. shuffling after every hand)
- damian2000 14y agoRather than hacking the video feed, its far more likely remote access to the feed was given to a second accomplice by the casino insider (who later was sacked). This second accomplice then signalled to the gambler by some other method (either physical or electronic). There's a bit more detail here: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/law-order/crown-casino-hi-tech-scam-nets-32-million/story-fnat79vb-1226597666337 http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/law-order/crown-casino-hi-t...
- joonix 14y agoCrown is poorly run with incompetent staff, not surprised and not sympathetic.
- peterjancelis 14y agoI think the chance of recovering the money is higher than zero, close to 1 in fact. All the casino has to do is store the tape and wait for facial recognition technology to take off on the web. In a decade or so we'll just be taping crimes and than the web will tell us which individuals have matching bone structures.
- rescripting 14y agoThe title of the article is misleading. He didn't steal it, he cheated the casino out of it. This is an important distinction since in the eyes of the law the casino willingly gave him the money when he cashed out. The casino can catch you cheating and prevent you from cashing out, but once you're out the door you're pretty much free (although I probably wouldn't come back). In fact the article actually says they've identified the man and banned him from the casino. If they had legal backing I'm sure it would have mentioned the manhunt, and not a "near zero chance of recovering the money."
- rtwtlkj 14y agoOr they are just making it up and using this as an excuse to never allow him to play in their casinos
- rollo_tommasi 14y agoGiven that it's an Australian casino, its highly likely that the gambler is associated with a syndicate working out of Southeast Asia (see for example the recent soccer gambling scandal). The problem isn't identifying who took the money, the problem is a) prosecuting and b) identifying and recovering assets in a tangle of opaque foreign legal systems.
- Samuel_Michon 14y ago"According to Barron Stringfellow" With a name like that, you'll either grow up to be a Bond villain or a casino consultant.
- Apocryphon 14y agoOr both.
- raldi 14y agoBetter title: "Man taps into security camera system to cheat casino out of $33 million"
- robomartin 14y agoAssuming this wasn't a case where an insider broke into security and installed a transmitter onto a specific video feed, isn't there an argument here as to who owns a presumably unencrypted RF signals? Also, is there an implied Terms Of Service you agree to when entering a casino? I've been to many and have never seen anything even remotely resembling a TOS. I was asked to stop playing roulette at a major Vegas casino a number of years ago. I wasn't betting big or making tons of money. I am what one might call a geek gambler: I enjoy devising ways to improve my odds. During my occasional trips to Vegas (example: Once a year for CES) I test the ideas with a couple of hundred bucks. It's purely for fun. If the goal was making money it'd be far more effective to spend four hours coding rather than gambling. Anyhow, on this particular occasion I had memorized a betting pattern that improved the probability of my bets winning. On average it seemed effective. I got kicked out when I won thirteen times in a row. Fun while it lasted.
- raldi 14y agoAssuming this wasn't a case where an insider broke into security and installed a transmitter onto a specific video feed, isn't there an argument here as to who owns a presumably unencrypted RF signals? No. Most gambling locales have a law against the use of hidden electronic devices to assist play. It has nothing to do with airwave rights.
- vincefutr23 14y agoyou cant' improve the probability in roulette with a pattern
- robomartin 14y agoI didn't say I improved the probability of the game. I improved the probability of my betting decisions producing favorable outcomes. Huge difference. Think of it as betting by considering the physics of the game vs. in complete ignorance. Betting single numbers, black, white, dozens, columns and rows is absolutely moronic once you stop to think about how the game actually works.
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- applecore 14y agoAny idea what game he was playing? Was he playing against other players or the house?
- shocks 14y agoProbably poker.
- csense 14y agoI'm guessing blackjack or roulette. For blackjack, he could use the outside accomplice to count cards, then start playing at a table with favorable shoe. For roulette, I think I've read elsewhere that precise timing of the spinning wheel allows you to model its physics well enough to figure out where it will land.
- jpatokal 14y agoSince the scam took place in the high roller room and the player was not Australian (read: most likely ethnic Chinese from somewhere in SE Asia), I'd wager baccarat.
- droithomme 14y agoPerhaps the words "steals" and "heist" are not the best choice given the man won the money playing cards and the claims that he must therefore have been using a second person to feed him information taken from video feeds is presented without any evidence.
- dhughes 14y ago> "Intercepting them [the surveillance signals] is simple as going down to a local Radio Shack," he told ABC. Hunh? At my workplace the surveillance room, as in most casinos, is segregated from the rest of the building by a separate entrance. Surveillance staff are not permitted to socialize with other staff and can't work in any job in the casino other than surveillance. The room has restricted swipe access via thick steel double-doors aka a "man trap" with poured concrete blocks and reinforced metal plates in the walls, of course Pelco PTZ cameras covering the outside of the doors. The camera system isn't accessible anywhere other than possibly in the ceiling of the gaming floor which would be pretty obvious having someone trying to splice in to a cable. Everything else goes to the surveillance room not to the server room other than maybe the corporate LAN and intrusion detection server but still that's a restricted access locked room but to get to that door there are several other steel doors you need to swipe through, not even the big boss has access to some of them, but I do ;) Our surveillance manager was telling me he trained in Las Vegas at some guy's house who teaches surveillance techniques to people in the industry. This guy has a multi camera setup in his home and tables too. He cheats at cards while on camera then shows it to the trainees but even he can't see himself cheating on camera even though he did it himself and knew he was on camera. Although I should add most times cheating especially Blackjack is from collusion between player and dealer. There is a reason why staff and patrons don't mingle or why staff can't use public washrooms when on-shift. Now I wait for the men in black to come knocking at my door I've said too much!
- triplesec 14y agoGood man, good hack. I have no sympathy for the casinos whatsoever.