Funny thing happened the other day

If you have slack security then it is not really betfairs fault is it?  However if your losing bets were matched significantly against one other account then I would expect betfair to take action.

Correct me if I am wrong but you and betfair should be able to check the IP address from which your losing bets were placed. That address may shed some light on who the culprit may be.

And how can they have collected commission if they were losing bets.

Also, what markets were the bets made in ?   If liquid markets they must have been placed at something close to the correct price and I don't see the point in anyone hacking into someones account and place bets at correct market odds.
   If they were matched at ridiculous odds on a non liquid market it should be easy for Betfair to investigate a little around your counterpart.

I think this sort of thing is going on a lot more than we think and certainly a lot more than BF would like to admit.

I was horrified a couple of months back on checking my security to find some attempted logons to my account from a Russian IP address.

I contacted BF and was given a new account within the day.

I would urge everybody to at least keep an eye on the security section of My Account.

The placing bets is there MO, not really sure why they do it, maybe they want a bigger pay day before they leave a trail of money out or its something to do with adding a withdrawal method.

Sorry Brendan I don't understand your point......?

It was to Eddie the Eagle

I don't see the point in anyone hacking into someones account and place bets at correct market odds

I dont really understand why they place bets from compromised accounts at fair vaule but ennough different people have said this is what they do for me to believe it

Taking Alex's point regarding "slack security": what do we think is an adequate set of security precautions? That is, what are the three, four, five golden rules that we should ensure we adopt?

For myself I do the following:

1. Change my Betfair password from time to time (probably only every 3 months or so)
2. Ensure my Microsoft security patches are up to date (have MS updates enabled)
3. Have an additional firewall (other than MS)
4. Have up to date virus protection

My question - is that sufficient, or for that matter overkill?

I also from time to time look at the things that are trying to access my PCs/servers.  This gets a bit scary, as there always seem to be a constant barrage of stuff from "universities" in China, Russia and other parts of the Eastern Bloc, and for that matter South America.

I suppose you could add:

5.  Don't keep money you don't need to in BF. That may not be practical because often you don't know when you will need the funds but this whole thing is very dangerous if somebody does access your account because you are not getting your money back, that's for sure.

It would be nice if there was some way you had an option of locking the funds in your account with a separate password.  Seems rough that if someone hacks your account you have to assume all of the liability.  It's a pain but every night I tie most of my bank up with a bet that's never going to get matched, of course whoever could cancel it but may not realise

And we never did get an explanation as to why BF removed the Country Restriction feature which would have saved you 'the mo' did we?

Eddie pretty much sums it up. Matching bets at fairish value will only net the perpetrators a tiny percentage. Think about it. If you had access to someone elses account and wanted to profit from it, how would you do it? The answer is, it's very very difficult. It makes this kind of fraud on Betfair unlikely. That's not to say security is not important because if someone has a grudge against you, they don't need to gain themselves, they just need you to lose. And that, as we all know, is dead easy.

Don No1 Joined: 03 Apr 05
Replies: 9019 13 Apr 11 20:31   


It would be nice if there was some way you had an option of locking the funds in your account with a separate password.  Seems rough that if someone hacks your account you have to assume all of the liability.  It's a pain but every night I tie most of my bank up with a bet that's never going to get matched, of course whoever could cancel it but may not realise


  That would be great and not to hard for Betfair to implement.
It could just be another wallet like the Aussie one, but with a password different from the main login one.

There's a lot of different things Betfair could do but they don't seem to do any.

1. Allow access only from your domicile country unless specifically authorised otherwise.

2. Allow users to block access to poker/the exchange/games.

3.  Allow one to keep surplus funds in a holding account separate.

are three that spring to mind for me.

.......................

Also I get the impression from the forum (and this could of course be misleading) that Betfair are not very helpful or act swiftly in involving the police and preventing misappropriated funds being prevented from being withdrawn subject to some sort of investigation.

........................

Obviously...

Dont keep more than you think you'll need in the account.

Change your password regularly and always straight after using Betfair on a mobile device via wifi or not on your normal computer. 

Dont give anyone else your log on details or let them browse your account

Dont use the same log on details for different betting accounts

Check your security section on Betfair regularly

I've emailed them Eddie, ill post up their response here

to Clydebanks list I would add:

Never use betfair on a public computer...or a friends or relatives for that matter.
Never use hotmail for your registered betfair account.

When I log on to my bank online, I have to slide my debit card into a card reader and enter my pin number.  If Bf could do that, no one could log on to your account without your log on card and pin.

Bayes "If you had access to someone elses account and wanted to profit from it, how would you do it? The answer is, it's very very difficult"

Surely it is very easy?  Go to a quiet market, put up odds of 1000 on the fav, match with your hacked account and there's a high chance you are quids in if you choose your market well.  If you do lose, it may cost you a tenner.  Repeat until hacked account is emptied.  Find new victim.

And who's the prime suspect in that instance?

The winning account who then withdraws and clears off and BF can do feck all about it.

TheVis, I don't think it's that easy.  Betfair has implemented all sorts of monitoring to avoid money laundring and frauds like this. There would be bells ringing somewhere in the Betfair towers if this was done and even if they were able to pull it off one time, Betfair would know who this person was and you could persue this person the legal way(could be difficult depending of country).
  Just to show how efficient Betfair's monitoring is :
A couple of years ago I played plenty of poker and I think it was 3 times I went heads up with a friend in order to lose $ 50 - 100 to him so that he would have funds for a tournament later that night.
  After the third time I got an long email from Betfair with an explanation of there policy and money laundring. Bottom line said that if we did this again we would be banned from Betfair for ever.

Bells may ring, but don't hold your breath on ever getting your money back - the original poster here didn't.

This is what they say in the terms and conditions:  "you are solely responsible for all their actions whether or not their access was authorised by you and you hereby indemnify us and hold us harmless against all costs, claims, expenses and damages howsoever arising in connection with the use of or access to your account by any third party."

So if somebody does get into your account, you are shafted.

Sorry, missed a bit from the T&Cs:

If another person accesses your account, you are solely responsible for all their actions whether or not their access was authorised by you and you hereby indemnify us and hold us harmless against all costs, claims, expenses and damages howsoever arising in connection with the use of or access to your account by any third party.

'Thank you for your e-mail and for your suggestion.

The country restriction feature associated with customer accounts is only available to be amended by Betfair staff.

Your comments have now been forwarded to our Product Development team for further attention.

We value your feedback and are always interested in finding out more about what user would like to see.

Please be advised that Betfair monitor the activity associated with all of our customers accounts. Should we notice activity on an account which requires further review and confirmation from the account holder, we will temporarily suspend the account until confirmation is obtained.

If you believe your account has been accessed by someone other than yourself or compromised in any way we ask that you contact Betfair to suspend your account and we will investigate your enquiry.

If you suspect that somebody may know the password for your Betfair account we recommend that you log into your account and change the associated password as soon as possible by clicking:

My Account > My Profile > Edit Password.'