Topic: Sportsbet.io stole all my deposits/balance (Read 609 times)

OP, my apology, it seems I missed your post [and your entire situation, LOL] in the middle of my discussion with Rating Place. I noticed that you haven't reply to my previous inquiry, do you mind to address it?

good points. It’s a no win situation. The losing side always says you’re on the take. You already know this from the forum as is. I'll have to think it over a little more too. The bad wording is on my part. Theymos asked me to clarify more. I said he answered what I wanted to know.

Sorry it took me a while to reply, it's quite a heavy chunk to digest, and I need to mull over it over the weekend.

First thing first, to straighten things up, perhaps it's a poor wording either from your side or theymos's reply, but I do not "want" to start a binding arbitration service in a sense that I am wishing to start a service of my own, where I give final say, like AG or CG.

Up to this point, taking every other past cases into consideration, I still like to think that I am not conceited enough to say that I have enough experience, influence, power, and whatever it needs to confidently give the final say of a case.

What I have in mind at the beginning of this discussion is an improvement of the forum by having a section where we can do our own ADR. The whole service is "supervised" by the forum, as it is part of their [new] board. Thus, theymos's approval.

There was a discussion about this in the past, quite a thorough one, proposed by someone else, but I can't find the discussion no matter what keyword I tried on ninjastic. It goes deep and thorough enough, discussing about how it will be a paid service, how a case will be mediated, [if I'm not mistaken] even who oversee and made the call, the whole process.

IIRC, my opinion on that topic was that it is not feasible. One, it was meant to be a paid service [the proposal was that the fund paid by the user of the service will be used to pay those "mediator], why would someone undergo a paid one when there are those that offer same thing for free?

Second, the bias accusation and the backlash of the findings. There are instances where a complainant got angered at CG's or AG's decision for not ruling into their side, and they accuses those ADR for colluding with the casino. I spent good amount of time, several times on several different occasions explaining things and disproving their counter-counter-counter-allegation.

Similar thing can extremely likely happen to our arbitrator.

Cases on point, even now, with the current situation where I am [or anyone else] not benefitted from any cases, there are disgruntled users who throw accusations at me, about how I am siding with casinos and under their payroll, etc., not that I'm losing sleep over those allegations [jokes on them, I have chronic insomnia], but still, I foresee those accusations will goes wild if there is any, even the smallest infraction, sign that I am gaining advantage from those cases by having an independent ADR service.

I think those risks can be somewhat mitigated if the ADR service is a section by the forum. This idea, I can still consider. But if the proposal is me having my own service, with me being [one of] the "prosecutor" and the judge [since I will be the one with final saying], I am very positive in believing that it will not be a popular and acceptable proposal.

Bottomline, at this point where I stood right now, I am not completely disagree with a proposal of having an ADR service board, of course, my stance will shift up or down with as it progresses and discussion about details of this service unfold, but not a service of my own, with me having the final and bindings saying. I haven't reach the level of King Solomon's wisdom.

If you'd still like to discuss this matter further [be it a proposal of a board or perhaps a group of ADR team], I'd suggest you to [as previously said] open a thread on meta, we're clearly has been waaay OOT here. I think many members will be interested to discuss the prospect further and give their insight. I will pitch in if you ever created that thread [just... mention me, I rarely visit meta].

1. Theymos has given you the OK to start binding arbitration although Theymos himself won't force the arbitration or be involved. I don't post private emails without permission but I think this section here is ok . Theymos said no sub-forum but could be proposed in meta if you would like.

2. I was wrong, multi-accounting was the first charge.

3. My disagreement/question isn't about Steve nor with you, it's with Sportsbet.

My reasoning is that if the player didn't take a bonus, there is no reason to multi-account at a casino. Sports play is different where cheating can be advantageous.

Lastly, if you were to run a binding arbitration section where both player and book agreed, it would be a great asset to the forum. All of us posters could ask questions and throw in our input. Currently, no arbitration service considers poster input and thoughts. You would make the final decision. I would also like to propose that arbitration be all or nothing. The player loses his whole balance if wrong. This cuts down on false accusations. If a player has already been paid his deposit but not his winnings, he must post up his balance returned before proceeding with arbitration.

I believe there is a misunderstanding from your side regarding that case about what I did [throwing more allegation] or did not [asking SB to prove for double spend]. Let me try to describe things in details the way I remembered it and see if we can find a common ground.

anonymousxm was initially suspected for multi acc and asked to perform KYC. On this matter, I asked him if he's the only one accessing SB from his home¹, his IP, his PC, those thing that can prove or invalidate multi-acc, whether we can cross the multi-acc allegation or if it's valid [regardless unintentionally due to cluelessness of fully deliberate]. Not long after this, OP [presumably] cleared his KYC and they found that OP utilize double spend method².

The situation then came to Steve's radar [I can't remember if I contacted him and notify him about it, inviting him to give his side or he came on his own, but I believe that part is irrelevant for now], he tried to get to the bottom of it, fast forward a little with some user tried to spice up the situation and stir the pot, and Steve came back with a final saying³ that he can't overturn the decision made by the team, and he suggested anonymousxm to pursue this case to a licensor, to give it another chance.

At this point, I don't think asking SB to provide a proof of their counter-accusation will be productive, do it? They're ready [as per Steve's effort] to get it escalated to the licensor, who are better equipped to tackle all of the violation counter-accusation made by SB [multi acc and double spend] at once, so why bother asking him to provide the same evidence here? If there is a merit in asking him at that point, then it must be eluded me, because I can't see any added benefit.

Meanwhile, this response of Steve, OP misunderstood it⁴ due to language barrier and thought Steve told him not to escalate it. And I explained to him that he understood wrongly⁵.

anonymousxm then escalated to the licensor, as per his commitment, and the case [apparently] got rejected with the verdict favoring SB⁶, of which I still tried to deescalate it, to consider if OP once again misunderstood things due to language barrier or to lose patience [licensor response time can be significantly longer compared to AG, CG, or this forum], and asking him to show us his last correspondence with the licensor, to be sure we are all on the same page⁷.

anonymousxm's response to this is to pull full Avatar Aang move, disappear when he needed him the most. If we may be exercise a bias, one might argue that he didn't come back because he knew he lost the case, that he's the wrong part. Otherwise, he'll publish those emails, even simply fueled by rage instead of trying to prove things.

He. Did. Not.

So, coming back to your initial inquiry, that I threw more allegation to anonymousxm, well, I believe I did not. I simply pointed out and brought back what SB initially wrote as their finding. And why don't I ask SB to prove the double spend counter-allegation, well [as explained above], what's the merit of it when both parties are inch away from taking it to the licensor who will validate everything with every possible private data accessible for them to verify?

Tell me which part do I did wrong on this case?

---

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

He was accused of double spending. All you had to do is ask Sportsbet to show proof and the case was over. We can’t shake down players looking for an excuse to steal their money.

It’s not an attack on your integrity which is why I think you would be the best one for binding arbitration. I come at things as a player advocate and the lack of accountability by the book is what I dislike. Some books are very dishonest when they know they can’t get caught in a lie.

They aren’t going to say after looking again, “oops my mistake, you weren’t double spending”. They are just going to stick by their decision.

Once the player hits the licensor, I agree that whatever the licensor says goes. The player can’t keep asking for new arbiters if he loses.

Every licensor is going to agree with the book and if I were a book, then I’d send every player to the licensor instead of AG.

I see your point in disrupting business from AG and CG if you were to do binding arbitration but complaints from BCT are a small percentage of their complaints. I trust the posters here more than paid sites and licensors.

I’ll shoot Theymos a PM and will get back if he replies.

In reply to being the forum's arbitrator, if theymos decided to have an ADR section of our own and created such board, then sure, I am more than happy to pitch in, but without his permission, I don't think anyone can open their own binding arbitration "service", and I doubt he will consider this as a new section on the forum. It was proposed at least once, that I know of. You're free to try to propose it on the meta section, though.

In reply to we should be player advocates... well, I prefer to be an impartial investigator, taking no one's side and remain neutral, as we all --those who oversee the scam accusations board-- should be.

It is a known fact that more than half of the cases on this board are actually the players trying to milk the casino. I couldn't see the ethic on advocating them. At the same time, there are casinos who love to play dirty, and I don't see the merit of advocating them as well. Thus, impartial sounds a lot better for me.

If you choose to be a player's advocate, though, it's all your call to make.


Hmm... how sure are we that it's a situation where two people exchanging ideas and opinion and not someone trying to attack someone else? I somehow feels like just receiving a punch. A weak one, but still...


On which part do I "took sportsbet's side" and threw in more allegations against the player? The part that I [as quoted] said, "probably other violation found by sportsbet's security team"?

Did you, umm... bother to read the whole thread and be sure you understood the entire situation there? Or were you randomly picked a thread, took a glance, and conclude based from several posts? OP was charged with multiple violation. He initially was accused for multi-acc, of which I tried to deescalate the situation by asking a possible innocent scenario that has potential to led to a multi-acc detection.

And, again, if you read the thread carefully, the player did not leave the thread because he saw that he won't get paid. Steve tried to deescalate the situation by having their own team handle the case, but that player eventually had to go to their licensor, which he did, and didn't get a reply.

When a licensor did not reply to a complaint, from what I recently learned, it means they found the ruling made by the casino is justified and they agreed to it and/or they find the player guilty.

So, him leaving the thread is more likely because he has exhausted every possible means and still can't overturn a verdict.

I will have to disagree on this "verification method".

As well established on those who frequently overseeing cases on this board, every case is unique, they should be approached on case-by-case basis. Cases that arrives in our plate are not 100% related and can be determined by wagers, lines, limits, and the whole other factor you use for profiling.

There are instances where a player was banned from casino after just a couple of bets. Will the betting history shows and get us to the bottom of the case for something like this? Will the data be enough? I don't think so. And though it sounds outrageous at first [how could a casino restrict their user from just a couple of bets], further investigation told us that the ban hammer was enforced by the sportsbook provider. The casino's hand are tied.

Another good example of how wagers can't instantly get us to the bottom of a case, someone complained about his bet got settled late, all of his bets are shown to be legit, all is good, casino acknowledge their mistake and refunded the bets, things goes further and fueled by greed, and only later on it is revealed that the player was self-excluded [after some drama] on other casino. Will player's wager help us finds out about it? I somehow doubted it.

And what about cases where players complaining for a bug or glitches, will their wagers help?



Please read the question again, I believe you're trying to answer what I quoted below? The question is if the casino got too tired to explain or finds it too obvious that they don't bother explaining that breach. They'll probably only come and say, "you breached several of our ToS." or perhaps doesn't even bother answering at all, because they deemed the forum too annoying and didn't worth their marketing time anymore [it is recently revealed that some casinos feel this way of our forum]. What then? Your explanation is you'd like to see a player answering relevant questions asked by the book.

How could they answer relevant question if there is no question at all because the casino feels like what I wrote above?



I am very sure BC also recently resort to arbitrator for a persistent case. And though I might be wrong, there are other casinos that also resort to either arbitrator or licensor when things can't be resolved. Rollbit, from the top of my head.


Ok, this is interesting. I know you say you're not attacking me personally, and rest assured that I didn't see it as such. I look at it as a good discussion. Two people trying to suggest two different ideas. These points below, though, I think it's in an urgent need of clarification.

I am taking a different approach to address the part by replying side by side, mine will be marked in blue.

1. You presume the player is guilty.

I presume every party is guilty. My method is to "strip" the players out of their lies first, to see if there are more I can dig from his story and how much he hide. All of these cleared, I'll invite the casino and listen to the story from their side, see if it made any sense. If it doesn't or I need more details, I'll demand it from them. I believe you can easily verify it from my posting history

2. You want to go through every rule that a sportsbook has, relevant or not, to see if the player has committed an infraction.

related to above about stripping. Also works for the casino. If the casino said the player breached point [for instance] 3.1.1. I'll go to that exact part and see if the allegation made sense and air-tight or they just throw random excuses.

3. The infractions doesn't even have to stand up in a court of law. You agree that what a book posts as a rule stands.

the agreement is actually between the casino or sportsbook and the players, not with me. I will be honest that I don't think I get the first part of your point perfectly, but if I understand it correctly, then... yeah, a breach of agreement on ToS can actually be filed for court room

3. You are forcing the player to show evidence even if detrimental to his job or work place.

I'm sorry, I what? Perhaps my memory is a bit rusty on this part, but I don't think I ever forced someone to show evidence that's detrimental to his job.

In fact, on one case, the player and community "entrusted" me with some private document, asking the casino to send it to me to verify, of which I politely declined. On other case, someone misunderstood my instruction and provided their ID on his thread [blurred, but still...] and I promptly reached to the user, asking them to remove the photo and ask them to reach JJ [not gonna attract more visitors here, but I am talking about the creator of talkimg] to scrub the photo from their database. How is this me forcing players to show evidence that are detrimental in nature?

4. Books such as Stake state that they can share information with 3rd parties. You may be putting a player in legal jeopardy or possible loss of job.

yes, they can, and from time to time, people overseeing the scam accusation boards will resort to those arbitrator to get things done, thanks to the private nature of their investigation. How do I exactly putting a player in legal jeopardy and loss of job by redirecting them to an ADR? The data being asked by casino on that ADR are completely out of my control, and with exception of recent [notorious] case of Stake v. KosherMania, I don't think I've encountered one that I oversee that could lead to a possible loss of job. Though again, as I can't stress this enough, those data being asked are out of my control. I did not dictate ADR's and casino's action and inquiry during their dispute resolution attempt.

5. In a situation that is he said, she said, you have stated on at least one occasion that you believe the word of the book.

I somehow get a feeling that I misunderstood what you tried to say, but if I am not and I understand it clearly, I actually mark the cases with such nature as "invalid" on my list. Meaning, the case have no supporting evidence that can help determine the real nature of the case. Thus, he said she said.

6. You do not require a book to show you how they came to the conclusion of a player's guilt using an excuse that sharing would hurt future cases. You must hold both parties to the same standard. Both parties must share all or both parties can withhold because it may hurt their future.

As explained again and again, those casinos invested a large sum of resources just to refine their detection system, which perpetually updated and require a pretty cost. Does it make sense to force the casino to explain it in public [those probably hundred of thousand of dollars of security system] to resolve one case, where those piece of information can and will be used by others to find a creative way to find a loophole.

On these cases, I believe I'll redirect them to arbitrator where the casino can freely provide those evidences in confidence [unless I am wrongly remember one or two cases, because I am typing this with less than 50% brain capacity as I am about to sleep actually when I get a notification of your reply.]

And oh, rather ironically, if I may repeat, SB actually the one that once dared to provide evidence of connected accounts publicly on this forum, and as expected, it's used against them not long after.

This is not a personal attack. I think you try to be an impartial judge. My feeling is the way you go about it is unfair to the player. It's very time consuming and player's funds are unnecessarily being held for an inordinate amount of time. If a book is holding up a player's funds for four months because of wanting irrelevant documentation, a warning should be given.

Umm... are you sure you're on the right thread? This one was only held for two months or so, with explanation actually provided not long after the incident happened.

If you want to get to the bottom of things fast then all you have to do is look at a player's wagers. Experienced gamblers can easily tell intent by looking at wagers and matching them up with lines and limits. Answering your question, what I would like to see is a player answering relevant questions asked by the book. If it's irrelevant, then let's not make the player jump through hoops.

The only book that has ever agreed to binding arbitration is Betcoin, not Sportsbet.

While not intentional, you start off taking the side of the book in every case. I'll use the following as examples.

1. You presume the player is guilty.
2. You want to go through every rule that a sportsbook has, relevant or not, to see if the player has committed an infraction.
3. The infractions doesn't even have to stand up in a court of law. You agree that what a book posts as a rule stands.
3. You are forcing the player to show evidence even if detrimental to his job or work place.
4. Books such as Stake state that they can share information with 3rd parties. You may be putting a player in legal jeopardy or possible loss of job.
5. In a situation that is he said, she said, you have stated on at least one occasion that you believe the word of the book.
6. You do not require a book to show you how they came to the conclusion of a player's guilt for reason that sharing would hurt future cases. You must hold both parties to the same standard. Both parties must share all or both parties can withhold because it may hurt their future.


This is not a personal attack. I think you try to be an impartial judge. My feeling is the way you go about it is unfair to the player. It's very time consuming and player's funds are unnecessarily being held for an inordinate amount of time. If a book is holding up a player's funds for four months because of wanting irrelevant documentation, a warning should be given. What I have just posted does not pertain to this Sportsbet case, it's in general.

I also think if a player is going to waste your time and that of the book, when the player posts a complaint and wants binding arbitration, then it's all or nothing. If the player is wrong, he loses his deposit. If the player is right, he gets winnings and deposits.

On this specific part, where the casino must prove a player is guilty, then Sportsbet actually one of the few casinos who dare to fulfill that task. Most casino are reluctant to provide their findings and detection system in public for the fear that abusers will learn from it and find ways around it. Those casinos are most likely willing to provide their findings to arbitrator, or licensor, where evidences can be limited strictly to pair of eyes only, enough to validate the counter-accusation.

I am not sure if other casinos ever do the same, I can not recall them from the top of my head and a bit too reluctant to browse the entire scam accusations board to verify it, but Sportsbet once took a bold step by describing their suspicions of connected accounts, one that become the basis of them banning a player, in public, where the player [as expected] then use that piece of information to try to spin the story... stupidly.


Or perhaps I am simply here, on this board, to see a case done? Regardless of who come as the cheater and who come as the victim? As stated numerous times, I am not benefited from any of those cases, I couldn't care less who "win" or who I "prosecute". I am not a prosecutor representing the book, or the player. I am simply here to see it done.

Perhaps where you and I differ is the presumption we apply. I [as mentioned several times, and for the lack of better term] mostly applies the "presumption of guilt" on every cases, well... an altered version of it; they're actually officially called "impartial investigation" if I am not mistaken, though I always have this thought that "presumption of guilt" [as controversial as it can be] fits better, where every side need to prove that they're innocent, that they are actually guilty, both the casinos and the players hide something or two [like the country they resides or the KYC they claimed to be 100% pure, or to say that a player set a late bet when they didn't and to void a bet that should be valid], thus a tendency to actively question everything ourselves is needed.

Perhaps the term "whodunnit" will fits better, where every side is being prosecuted, questioned.

While you... well, I don't think I need to explain the concept of presumption of innocence, that's what applied on most [if not every] country and law system in the world.

Sadly, IMO, that concept can not be used as an approach in this board, there are way too many people with hidden agenda.

Nonetheless, it's an interesting proposal you give here, to wait for casino or sportsbook to make a counter-accusation, i.e. to let them mention the terms being breached, and let the player prove that the counter-accusation is wrong, and then the casino do a rebuttal, and the player do another rebuttal.

What are expected from us, then? We are not actively seeking for our own truth whether the casino tried to cheat their player or the player tried to cheat the casino, so we... sit, wait, and read until it resolves itself?

Further, if I may, how do you propose an approach to a case where the player is clearly breached one or several clauses of the ToS they had with a casino [like accessing from Germany when it's specifically written to be a restricted country], but the casino was way too busy to explain, or too tired with the player as it's quite obvious that they don't bother explaining? The casino is the guilty one, then? As they "can't" prove beyond reasonable doubt that the player is guilty, thus presumption of innocence dictate that the player is innocent? While it's there, plain as day, that the player is guilty, no need to be further proven.

No one can prove that they are innocent. A person is presumed to be innocent. The book must prove a player is guilty. If the book can't prove a player guilty, then the player is innocent. I don't want to bore you with examples but some at Sportsbet aren't always honest.

I really like the job you do in this forum as well as AHOYBRAUSE and some others but there's another thing that I disagree with you on in the same vein. The OP hasn't been accused of playing from a banned jurisdiction. I don't think that you should go searching for rules that have been broken. The book has to make an accusation and then the player must prove the accusation to be false. Your role is that of an arbiter, not a prosecutor. When you search for rules broken on your own, then you've become a prosecutor representing the book.

Treating the other case I am currently overseeing as an isolated case, I find the statement above [the one I underlined] somewhat contradictive. If someone is innocent, they should be able to pass the KYC, thus they will not get caught in the net. If they get caught in the net, then they are not innocent.

There's no reason to play at Sportsbet. Your lines are awful, some of the worst that I've ever seen. Stake and Sportsbet are very similar. Both are bad books for players but pay to recruit those that don't know better. Both books also do more KYC than others. I'm sure a lot of innocent players get caught in the net.

 

You just can't keep my name out of your mouth, can you?
NEWSFLASH; we don't care what you think and no one takes your little troll account seriously

I have no love for those opening multiple accounts. Whatever punishment handed down is fine. I was confused by Jeremy’s reply. Thanks for the clarification.

Quite safe to assume that they did from OP's very little explanation and the lack of clarification. Their findings [alt-account] is quite logical if we assume OP is from restricted country, don't you think? OP will need other accounts since his other ones were banned.

And that'll be [at least] two points being breached. I am sure OP is at an overall profit from the previous accounts and abuses, otherwise SB will return his initial deposit.

Did Sportsbet take his deposit and winnings?

Never in a million years would this happen; anyone suggesting otherwise is a complete dolt

update:
I still have not received any response from Sportsbet.io and from the specified user on bitcointalk although he was online more than once and even made a post in the sportsbet.io thread. it looks like sportsbet.io does not care about my case. They are just stealing my winnings and even all of my deposits...