Part I: Card Game Cheating · Collusion & Electronic Cheating at Card Games

Scam #38: Multi-Accounting

How it works

A single player creates and operates multiple accounts on the same poker site, often using different identities. This provides several unfair advantages: the player can hide their true playing style by rotating accounts, gather more data on opponents than permitted, play at the same table as themselves (self-collusion), enter the same tournament multiple times to increase winning chances, and avoid detection by spreading play across aliases. In its most egregious form, a player controls multiple seats at a single table, seeing multiple hands and coordinating play between their own accounts.

Where it appears

Online poker

On the record

In 2006, Justin Bonomo admitted to multi-accounting on PartyPoker and was banned. In 2015, Jared Bleznick was banned from PokerStars for using multiple accounts simultaneously at the same cash game table. In 2020, Bryan Huang was banned for registering multiple accounts in tournaments. Multi-accounting remains one of the most common forms of online poker cheating.

Published as a detection reference for surveillance, compliance and gaming-operations professionals. Thresholds and tuning are set by the property. Nothing here is instruction — the method is described so it can be recognised.