While there are many people who have lofty ambitions of becoming a professional poker player, this is not the dream for everyone. There are plenty of poker players that are happy to have some fun with friends or who will play to pass the time. As online poker becomes more popular in the United States, there is no doubt that there will be an increase in the number of professional and amateur poker players in the United States. It is inevitable that it is the professional players who will receive more of the publicity and promotion but there are also some great amateur players looking to get involved.
This is why the news that the website for the World Poker Tour Amateur Poker League, more commonly referred to as the WPTAPL, has been hacked will be of interest to many players. There is no doubt that when it comes to the US poker online community, a lot of people will be interested in this organisation or will have friends or associates who do.
The news of the hack was exposed when a twitter user, with the former account @smitt3nz, posted over 175,000 email addresses and the plain text passwords associated with these accounts to a website. While the site doesn’t offer real money gaming options and there is no perceived threat of financial issues arising, it is understandable a concerning state of affairs for many people. One possible issue that arises could come from the fact that many people will use the same password for a number of sites. This means a player who has the same setup for other accounts may find that they are at risk.
The widespread nature of the leak can be seen in the wide variety of government emails that were listed on the site. The Department of Homeland Security, the United States Courts, NASA, the IRS, the United States Marines, the Air Force and even the United States Department of Justice were listed on the site. This means that there is every chance that the government will look to take action. This may not have been the case if there wasn’t such a high concentration of government official email addresses included but the situation is what it is.
The site is sanctioned by the WPT as being a hub for a number of free live events that take place across America while there are also events taking place in Canada and the United Kingdom. The organisation is focused on bringing people from different skill-sets together to help them to hone their skills and test themselves against a range of opponents from around the world.
One area of note about the leak can be found in the amount of people who still have the same default or default reset password. Of the 175,333 accounts that were affected, 46,901 have the exact same password. It is unlikely that so many people have the same shared interests or common hobbies, so it is very likely that this is a system default setting. Worryingly, the fact that this password has been cited means that some hacks and questionable people may use this information to their own methods. Hopefully this site, and all other sites, will alter the default password to ensure that no one is hacked.
The WPTAPL site features the Authorize.net emblem, which may be ironic for some people, as this organisation promises to offer “its merchant customers with the highest level of transaction processing security, safeguarding customer information and combating fraud.”
