The world of Bitcoin and digital currencies started out as a place to learn about new technology, but also have fun at the same time. As a result of that ideology, several developers have come up with various types of games which can be played in exchange for Bitcoin and altcoins. As these games evolved, and most of them become provably fair, a whole new niche was created. But just because a site says it’s probably fair, doesn’t mean it won’t try and cheat you out of your money. Take 999Dice for example.
999Dice – Bitcoin , Litecoin and Dogecoin Gambling
Most of you may have never heard of 999Dice before, but that should come as no surprise as there are tons of digital currency dice gaming sites in existence. However, by supporting not just Bitcoin, but also Litecoin and Dogecoin, 999Dice at least attempted to distantiate themselves from other dice gaming platforms currently in existence.
The dice betting game which was to be found on 999Dice is the same script as used by the popular Just-Dice website. One of the signs that was worrisome -to say the least- was the fact that 999Dice claimed to have a 0.1% house edge, which is not only incredibly low, but also nearly impossible to maintain if you want to run a business. However, that number did attract a lot of players.
Note from the author : A 1% house edge means you will receive 1.98x your stake when you win the 50/50 game. With a 0.1% house edge, users would earn back 1.999x your stake, as you have a 49.9% chance to win instead of just a 49% chance.
But how could a profitable dice game offer such odds, especially considering they are touting to be “provably fair”? Quite simply, because the site wasn’t provably fair at all. Provably fair gambling sites will publicly show the randomly generated hash associated with each game that is being played, which can then be verified by the player to make sure there is no cheating going on by “the house”.
999Dice on the other hand, is not displaying this provably fair hash publicly, but instead hides it behind a button a user must click. While this might not seem to be a big difference to several of our readers, it has a nifty feature. Once the 999Dice APi recognizes that a user has clicked to see the hash, they know they cannot cheat on the outcome of that game. However, if a user does not click, there is no way anyone can verify whether or not the outcome was tampered with or not.
This maliciously installed deception was discovered by BitcoinTalk user keepingquiet, who explained us how this works in detail :
“Until you click that button, you cannot see the hash. If you NEVER click that button, that seed, and the hash that is generated from it, can be WHATEVER THE HELL 999dice wants and needs the seed to be. Are you on a big winning streak, and feeling lucky, and place a huge bet? Are you on a horrifically bad martingale losing streak, doubling your 5 satoshi bet all the way up to 3.35 bitcoin and praying to god you don’t lose AGAIN? **DID YOU CLICK THE BUTTON TO GET THE HASH BEFORE YOU BET?**
No? Oh, ok then – sorry – you lost the roll. I guess it was just really bad luck. Do you want to validate that it was actually a losing roll and make sure we aren’t cheating? Ok, here’s the server seed we used, right there on the hard to find and not explained how to get there validation page, you can use that with the client seed and the bet number and you can validate and see clearly that it all matches up. See? We aren’t cheating.
Wait, hold on a second… how the hell do you know that seed wasn’t created AFTER you clicked the bet button and the site decided it was time for you to lose? YOU CAN’T. SUCK IT. It is utterly impossible. Because since there’s a new hash with every bet, if you didn’t request the hash before that crippling losing bet, piss off loser, you can’t prove a thing. Once you click bet, if you didn’t copy/screenshot the hash that proves they did not generate the seed AFTER you clicked bet, it’s gone. With no way to EVER. PROVE. ANYTHING.”
To make matters even worse, once you open the “Provably Fair” tab in your browser, you will see a randomly generated hash after clicking the button. If you kept the tab open , notice that the button reappeared after playing the game, forcing users to click it again to make sure the outcome of the game is legit. This occurs every single bet.
Confiscating User’s Winnings After Exposing The Truth
Bitcointalk user Keepingquiet altered the scripts he was using to play on the 999Dice game site to pull the hash from every game in order to force the system to leave the outcome untampered. After winning 61 Bitcoin over the course of 14 hours, he suddenly received a message saying that his account has been blocked and all of his winnings are being confiscated by the site owner.
Needless to say, all signs are pointing to the 999Dice site owner being caught red-handed and throwing a “hissy fit” in order to save face. In fact, things have gotten so out of hand that the 999Dice website has been taken offline, without any warning or notice to be found. It looks like the site owner has fled the Bitcoin community for now, and it wouldn’t surprise us to see him/her putting up another dice site in the near future.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.