How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters

Posted By admin On 24/07/22

Casinos’ efforts to catch card counters have gone high-tech in recent years. Case in point, they now put RFID chips in cards. Bloodhound and Protec 21 software, for example, uses these chips in cards to try and determine a player’s edge. RFID tech is also being put in chips to track wager sizes. Why do casinos not allow card counting if it is perfectly legal?. We have to understand something about the world of casinos and card counting. If you all know about the history of counting cards and also gambling. Then, everybody would know the. Never Stay in One Spot Too Long. Prior to the 2008 Great American Recession, casinos were more. Image Credit: mirror.co.uk. Another popular method of scamming casinos is card counting. It is not necessarily deemed illegal but if casinos pick up on even the slightest hint of.

  1. How Do Casinos Catch You Counting Cards
  2. How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters Free
  3. How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters Online
  4. How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters Fortnite
  5. How Do Casinos Detect Card Counters
  6. How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters Test
Update on
They thought that the world was their oyster. Then, technology caught up with them. Card counters are the bane of casinos, but this perennial game of cat and mouse is entering a new stage. The big question is: how to spot a card counter? Casinos seem to have found an interesting solution by recruiting card […]

They thought that the world was their oyster. Then, technology caught up with them. Card counters are the bane of casinos, but this perennial game of cat and mouse is entering a new stage.

The big question is: how to spot a card counter?

Casinos seem to have found an interesting solution by recruiting card counters to help them address the issue, and yet – there is no one way to pinpoint the mavericks who come to the casino floor to pilfer the Baccarat and Blackjack tables.

Despite the difficulties that now lie ahead, card counters are still going to try, but casinos are also getting smarter. From facial recognition to having card counters on the payroll themselves, the casino ecosystem is evolving. Some card counters find these new challenges just as titillating as winning a big pile of cash.

How to Spot Card Counter: Facial Recognition

Old acquaintances of the casinos will often run into a wall when they want to enter properties from which they have been evicted in the first place. While the fake beard and glasses camouflage might have worked in the past, these days it’s a signal that the customer is fishy.

Not only that, but casino facial recognition software, and the technology’s power is leveraged in the world’s gaming centers, from Las Vegas to Macau. Having automated solutions, though, doesn’t quite cut the whole thing, as this is only good for individuals who have been blacklisted from the property. There are many fresh faces to consider as well.

Eyes in the Sky and Security’s Watch

No casino customer is ever alone. The cameras that hang from the ceiling are there to keep a vigilant watch and security have eyes on all gamers. Now, this doesn’t mean that they are prying in your business unless you make yourself worthy of attention.

How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters

The casino’s security is continuously watching and trying to spot gamers who are showing symptoms of card counting. Unusual concentration is usually the first sign of a guilty party, and the casino has several ways of prodding a player to establish whether they are up to no-good.

Can You Hold Your Liquor?

Card counters are often showered with complementary drinks. Casinos have long established that the average customer doesn’t turn a free drink and if they are reluctant to imbibe the brew, then this is only one more reason to look into the customer.

Staff is sent to try and distract the individual and card counters are once again reluctant to bandy words while a hand is dealt. While a casino has to do some guessing work, these red flags are enough to win a potential card counter all the attention they have been hoping to avoid.

Shuffling After Dealing

You don’t have to picture casinos as places where security comes along with a few brawny looking guys who are quite happy to toss you out of the property. Rather, casinos prefer to beat you at the table. So, they ask dealers to shuffle more often, adding a new layer of difficult to card counters. Make no mistake, though, because this is just one of the many steps.

Your drinks will keep coming and the waitress staff will be particularly loquacious. If you are in the position of a card counter yourself, then you can rest assure that the casino is onto you.

Adding decks to the shoe is also used as a deterrent and making things a little more difficult even for counters to work their magic.

Secret Customers Aren’t Card Counters’ Friends

Meanwhile, casinos don’t only require on “control” to oversee all that is going on on the casino’s floor. There are secret customers who amble around the casino floors and try to identify other customers who exhibit the behavior that is commonly associated with card counting.

How

Want to go to a casino and beat the house by counting cards? Then remember that apart from learning how to count cards, you will have to learn how to not flinch in the face of mounting pressure.

Hiring the Pros to Help Out

In many cases, casinos have figured that they can do some good and help a card counter make a living without gaming the system. Instead of trying their luck with a fake mustache, gifted card counters have been asked to join the surveillance and security teams at casinos. Not all of them agree, of course as you have all sorts there.

There are MIT scientists, mathematicians, physicians, and even people who hold down regular jobs but have decided to teach themselves how to count cards. Some do it for the thrill and kicks, others just want a quick buck.

In any case there are those card counters who are actually applying for a job by laying financial waste to casino tables – these are the people who also wouldn’t turn the drinks nor avoid chatting up a fellow gamer, which makes identifying them even harder.

Spotting the Teams of Card Counters

Card counters these days don’t always work alone. Some do it for the fun of having a partner, others have devised even more successful strategies along with others. A good example of a team that really knows what it’s up to is MIT Blackjack Team proved that counting cards can be perfected down to a scientific principle.

Yet, successful card counters today have to do with so much more than just crunching probabilities in their heads. Aptitude at maths has never really been an issue. But playing on a casino floor at a time when there are eyes everywhere and each security member has been trained to spot the card counters – isn’t.

To be successful, a card counter has to feel comfortable which doesn’t come easy to all. For starters, smart people aren’t really inclined to cheat in the first place, especially if they appreciate scientific endeavor above all else.

Card counting is here to stick and as casinos become better at spotting it, so do players devise newer and cleverer tricks to beat the house. It’s an ongoing fight.

    Tags:

How Do Casinos Catch You Counting Cards

The casino’s battle to keep card counters from beating them is well known. They routinely use various measures to identify advantage players (APs) and kick them out.

Of course, they’re not always successful in this endeavor. But they do catch a lot of card counters and ban them.

If you’re interested in counting cards, you can benefit by knowing what techniques casinos use to identify and/or stop APs. Here are 7 methods that casino is used to root out counters.

1 – Lower Natural Blackjack Payouts

The general public has a common misconception that casinos spend massive amounts of time looking for and chasing APs. The movie 21 has a lot to do with this idea.

How do casinos catch you counting cards

Pit bosses do spend some time looking for counters. But for the most part, casinos let the rules work for them.

Back in the 1960s, when card counting was first getting started, blackjack rules were extremely favorable across many tables. However, the industry gradually changed this by instituting house-friendly rules.

The worst of the bunch involves lowering the natural blackjack payout from 3:2 to 6:5. This single change increases the house edge by 1.39%.

Everybody from APs to amateurs have to deal with 6:5 payouts in many casinos. But card counters are largely to blame here.

Gambling establishments use 6:5 payouts to lower potential profits for APs. But they also benefit by making more money off unsuspecting novices too.

2 – Add More Decks

Just like with 3:2 natural payouts, real money blackjack tables previously featured single-deck games. A single deck lowers the house edge by 0.5% when compared to the common eight-deck shoes of today.

Aside from increasing the house edge, more decks also make it tougher to have confidence in your count. Here’s an example to explain:

How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters Free

  • A table features a six-deck shoe.
  • You start counting and have a +4 count after one deck.
  • Normally, a +4 count would be really good.
  • But with five decks remaining, your +4 count isn’t as strong.

Some casinos dangle single-deck blackjack to draw players. This move works because many gamblers understand that a single deck is more favorable than multiple decks.

However, casinos also include 6:5 natural payouts. The 1.39% house edge increase from 6:5 payoffs definitely overshadows the 0.59% decrease from a single deck.

3 – Allow Less Deck Penetration

Deck penetration refers to how much of the shoe a dealer goes through before shuffling. If they deal four out of eight possible decks, then they’re allowing 50% penetration.

This concept is extremely important to card counters when it comes to the common multi-deck games of today. You stand a better chance of winning money when you get further into the shoe.

Again, you can have more confidence in your counts after seeing more cards. Fewer remaining cards make it more likely that positive counts will result in profits.

For example, a +2 count can lead to profits. However it provides a thin edge that won’t necessarily result in winnings at 50% deck penetration or less.

You want fewer cards left, so that a positive count indicates a larger percentage of 10s and aces remaining in the shoe. 75% deck penetration, or better, is ideal for making this happen.

Some casinos do allow this amount of penetration so that they can keep games moving faster. As a result, they rake in more profits from amateurs.

How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters

Other casinos, however, are too leery of card counters to allow 75% of the shoe to be dealt. You definitely want to avoid these establishments.

4 – No Mid-Shoe Entry Rule

As covered above, deck penetration is really important with regard to successful card counting. You want to see as many cards/hands as possible to gain more faith in your count.

If this is the case, though, why not just count off to the side and jump into the game later with a favorable count? Actually, many counters from the past used this exact strategy.

Gambling author Stanford Wong was the first to write about this technique. This strategy has been known as “wonging” ever since. Wonging is a foolproof strategy that can result in big profits. The only problem, though, is that casinos have been wise to it for decades.

Most blackjack tables feature a sign that states “no mid-shoe entry.” You can’t enter these games until a new shoe starts.

The no mid-shoe entry rule is specifically designed to prevent wonging. If casinos didn’t institute this rule, they’d get crushed by APs.

5 – Chat with Players

Pit bosses have a lot of responsibilities around the gambling floor. Therefore, they don’t just sit around watching for card counters all day.

However, when a pit boss does catch wind of a potential card counter, they need to monitor their play. Sometimes, just the pit boss standing and watching the player is enough to back them off.

Other times, though, the pit boss takes a more-direct approach that involves chatting with the player. They may start out with a harmless conversation about the game or another matter.

But their end goal is to get the player to stop counting or even kick them out, depending upon the casino’s policy. These chats let the AP know that they’ve potentially been spotted and need to stop counting.

6 – Limit Bet Sizes

Sometimes, the talks described above result in the pit boss taking action. One of their favorite methods for dealing with counters involves limiting their bet size.

How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters Online

The pit boss has two different options in this case:

  • Cap how much the player can bet (e.g. no more than $50).
  • Force the AP to flat bet (e.g. $10 every hand).


The first route ensures that APs can’t take advantage of positive counts. After all, one needs to raise their bets at some point to capitalize on positive counts.

The second route accomplishes the same goal—only in a more-extreme manner. It doesn’t matter how skilled a card counter is if they can only bet $10 on every hand.

Pit bosses can limit bet sizes when they’re unsure if a particular player is actually counting. Assuming the gambler isn’t counting, they may continue playing even if they’re only allowed to flat bet.

7 – Ban Players & ID Them

The most-extreme method for dealing with card counters involves banning them from the casino. A ban may extend to all of the corporation’s properties.

How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters Fortnite

If you get caught counting at MGM Grand, for example, then you’ll be banned from every single MGM casino throughout the world.

Many gambling establishments try to get your ID after catching you counting. They use this information to ensure that they can better identify you, in case you ever try stepping foot in their casino(s) again.

In the worst-case scenario, they’ll enter you into an international database of known advantage players. Such a database allows many casinos to check for your info if they suspect that you’re a card counter.

You may think that you must hand over an ID upon request. After all, casinos need to ensure that they only allow players who meet the legal gambling age.

How Do Casinos Detect Card Counters

The truth of the matter, though, is that no casino employee can legally force you to provide identification. Only a law-enforcement officer can do so.

If you’re a serious card counter, then you should never give a casino worker your ID. They’ll likely use this info against you and ensure that gambling establishments can better identify you as an AP in the future.

Conclusion

How Do Casinos Catch Card Counters Test

Casinos have known that card counters can beat them ever since the 1960s. They’ve spent considerable time learning how to spot card counters and stop them.

Rule changes are one simple way to hurt an AP’s bottom line. Unfavorable rules, such as 6:5 natural payouts, severely lower a card counter’s profit potential.

Of course, some APs still make money even with bad rules. So, casinos also have pit bosses watch for suspected counters and take necessary actions.

You might find this information discouraging, but you’re better off knowing it than not. That way, you know what to watch out for in case you get into card counting.