History of Slots Cheating

Today, slots technology makes it impossible to cheat a mobile casino South Africa slot machine. The machines are designed to be extremely secure and impenetrable. This wasn’t always true. In the past, slot machines were vulnerable to attack by advantage players and cheaters. Ever since the first Vegas casinos brought in slot machines, they were targeted by those who felt that they could take advantage of weaknesses in the machine technology and manipulate the payouts.

Some history of physical slot machine cheats and scams throughout the years.

Early Machines

Early slot machines had multiple flaws that were exploited. The most primitive of these cheats involved popping the arm of a one-arm-bandit after a winning reel. To do that, the arm was drawn downward and the gear was cocked to get the reels spinning. By releasing the tension the outcome could be randomized. So before the tension could be released, the arm was slapped which kicked it past the gear and locked the reels in their previous position. In that way, when the arm returned to its starting position, the reels would register another (identical) win!

Another early cheat involved picking the poorly-made and easily located locks. That offered access to the internal mechanism. The lock-picker would then add weights or file gears to influence the outcome. It’s hard to see how a cheater could count on knowing how to take advantage of this method but there were many who were ready to try.

Over the years the mechanical machines became more secure and mechanical flaws were addressed but cheaters still found ingenious ways to beat them.

Light Bulb

At one time a light sensor was used to control the number of coins that the machine paid out. Every time a coin passed the light sensor would block the light for a split second. That gave rise to a new method of cheating.

There was a tiny bulb connected to the end of a piece of thin plastic. The bulb was shaped in a way that allowed it to slide into the hopper and contact the sensor that was reading the light. In this way, the coins that passed into the tray were monitored.  Every time the light was broken, it registered that a coin was paid out. Coins would be drawn from within and spit out until the required number of coins was paid out.

To override the sensor, the cheater would shine his own device into the sensor. He would position his secret bulb in front of the sensor and switch it on whenever the machine paid out. Coins would be ejected behind the light thanks to the cheater’s own light. Then the machine would keep spitting coins until the light was turned off.

Thieves would play the light sparingly so the machine would only eject a few extra coins at a time. Once the scam was detected, slot machine designers retrofit the slots with a hinged plastic guard that moved in front of the sensor from below. In this way, they believed, any attempt to apply “the light” would completely block the sensor. This, they reasoned, would make this scam impossible to execute.

But cheaters had another idea. They were able to overcome this fix-it plan with the “Monkey’s Paw.”

Monkey’s Paw

The solution that was meant to protect the slot machines from the light bulb scam led to another method of manipulating payouts. In fact, the hinged guard made it even easier to effect a cheat. This system, nicknamed the “Monkey’s Paw,” eliminated the previous light cheat’s need to be soldered.

The Paw, which was a piece of stiff, thick wire, connected to a battery. It was bent in a way that made it match the internal shape of the machine.  The end of the “paw” would quickly slide up to the underside of the hinged plastic guard (the one that had been installed to stop the light from being used), push up the guard to block the sensor and make each coin last longer. The amount of time that the coin would last was based on the amount of time that the light was blocked from the sensor’s perspective.

So it would seem as if only one coin dropped while, in actuality, once the light was broken, several coins could pass.

Bill Readers and Payout Slips

Over time, bill readers and payout slips began to replace the old mechanical payout devices but these elements also had flaws that could be exploited.

A thin, flat projecting wire that was built onto a pocket garage door opener could be slid under a bill as it was inserted into the reader. Every time the button was pressed it would send a signal to the reader that caused the reader to register it as a hundred-dollar bill.

A cheater could insert one dollar and then press the button continuously until the machine registered 900 dollars (to go beyond 900 dollars at one shot would alert management). Then, a second partner would move in and start playing on that machine and score prizes. At cash-out the 2nd partner would score thousands of dollars in prizes.

By using the system sparingly in several locations and hitting several casinos and multiple machines each night the thieves could collect big payouts.

RNGs

To date, no one has figured out a way to take advantage of the Random Number Generator technology that determines the wins for both online slots and land-based slot machines. There hasn’t yet been an identified strategy for beating the machine’s odds and overcoming the RNG mechanism.  And this is what makes Springbok THE 100% secure and fair online casino it is.