Monday, May 26, 2008

Player loses seventeen thousand dollars because of identity theft

By Steve Briggs

A player who had over thirty thousand dollars in an online sport book (BetCris) was horrified to discover after logging into his account some two month's later, that someone had taken about twenty thousand out of the account. Since this person is also a gambling guide of sorts (he's a poker guide), he knew to contact support immediately and change the password to the account. He was then asked to send proof of identity documents to their customer service manager. The player-victim was told the account was now locked and that no further changes would be possible until the matter was resolved. He was told to contact BetCris the following day to address the issue in its entirety.

The player-victim was shocked to see the next day when he logged back into the account that once again someone had been placing bets using the account. He immediately contacted the support manager who was handling his case and asked how this could be possible when he was told the account was locked and no further bets would be allowed until the matter was resolved. The reply was as shocking to this writer as I'm certain was the shock of seeing the account had once again been compromised. He was told by the support manager that he had no idea how this was possible because he had made multiple notes on the account to not allow any further action. The support manager went on to say that he had tracked down the culprit along with the IP address and phone number etc.

When asked to supply a timeline of the incident the player-victim supplied this list. The ID sent to BetCris was issued on the eleventh of May, just a day before the matter occured, and was valid only until the fifteenth of May. There is no way anyone else could have had that valid ID, so how could BetCris make the claim they had two people sending valid ID for the same account? He was told his account was locked until the matter had been resolved yet the thief was able to call in and have the account unlocked using no more information than was used to originally gain access. Not only that but the support team gave out the new password to the thief or he'd never have been able to access the account even if he had been able to get the account unlocked (which he was successful). The thief was given this information while the support manager was on the other phone with the player-victim no less! On top of all that the money in the account was suppose to be tied up into a bonus scheme that required there be a play-through of over $200,000 which he was aware and had no complaints about it. In fact this as it turns out is a big red flag about the whole mess. What sport book allows you to transfer money out of their establishment before you've met the bonus terms? Answer to that is none that I am aware, at least not until now. Frankly I doubt you or I could get away with that kind of behavior so it really makes one wonder about how this money was allowed to be released? The money went to another sportbook called Rio sportbook. The player-victim had never heard of this place before now and therefore certainly did not transfer money to it.

At the time of this writing BetCris has seemingly washed their hands of the matter despite continued pressure from this writer and several other gambling guides who along with my self warned BetCris to step up and do the right thing or we'd be writing about the matter but to no avail. What this writer has taken away from this whole fiasco is to be sure to find out from any sport book or casino if they allow money transfers to other casinos or sport books? That seemingly is the only way I can see a thief having the opportunity to get their hands on your money is by transfering the money to another establishment where the thief had created an account using the victim's name and their method of withdrawal. So for instance the thief would add his/her NETeller account as a deposit/withdrawal method and then they could after transferring the money be able to get it into someplace where they can actually get their hands on it.

About the Author: