Select Page

Online poker site Checkraised accidently ships trojan/rootkit thingie in the payload of a rake calculator (“rake” is a term denoting the percentage the house charges in a poker game):  

In December 2005 we contracted a programmer to create a rake calculator for us. The rake calculator (known as rbcalc, rbcalc.exe) was an executable file that a player would run on his machine to calculate rake from hands he previously played (stored in hand history files or a poker tracker database).

It has recently come to our attention that early versions of this program that we received contained a virus that installs itself every time the user runs rbcalc.

The virus goes undetected by Norton AntiVirus and Microsoft Defender, even to this day. This is why we never noticed it until a 3rd party contacted us about the malicious software.

Link here.

ComputerActive has a bit more:

The malware then covertly stored gamblers’ information and the executable files allowed hackers remote access to the victims’ computers.

The stolen information has been used to log into various online poker websites including Partypoker, Empirepoker, Eurobetpoker and Pokernow. Having gained access, the hacker can then play poker against himself, losing on purpose and reaping the rewards.

Absurd.

Alex Eckelberry
(Thanks Catherine!)