Absolute Poker Cheating Blamed on Employee

It looks as though thousands of online poker players may soon be crying victory in their fight to out supposed cheating occuring at popular online site, Absolute Poker.

According an article today on MSNBC, an anonymous source told MSNBC that at least one of the accused cheaters, whose winnings were estimated to be upwards of $700,000, did indeed have the ability to see players' hole cards.

"This is literally a geek trying to prove to senior management that they were wrong and he took it too far," MSNBC reports their source at Absolute Poker as having said.

Absolute Poker was expected to have released an official statement Friday morning, but as of press time no such statement has been released.

While the culprit involved in this online cheating scandal has apparently been discovered to be a "rogue programmer," anonymous sources at Absolute Poker claim that upper management had no idea that such cheating was going on.

"We acknowledge a significant internal security breach whereby a resource who was infinitely knowledgeable about the system was able to get into the accounts in question. He played on those accounts and he saw hole cards," MSNBC reports the spokesman as having said. "We have closed that security breach and we have identified a very serious issue internally as far as communications flow and we're resolving that."

It is expected that Absolute Poker will be refunding all of the players affected by the cheating, apparently "with interest," though it is unclear how such reimbursements will be calculated.

Furthermore, MSNBC's source claims that Absolute Poker is pondering filing charges both criminal and civil against the employee.

Annie Duke, widely recognizable pro and the top female professional poker player in the world, notes to the online community that there is no need to fret in the wake of this news.

"This kind of stuff happens in live games all the time," says Annie. "You just don't hear about it as much. That's why it's important for players to know how to spot cheating. As for this situation, what's important is that the site steps up to the plate, acknowledges what has happened, and does the right thing."

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