Quebec’s provincial gambling monopoly has been hit with a class action suit by a poker player who claims the monopoly’s online poker software had an Apple-sized glitch.
On June 1, a class action lawsuit was filed in Quebec Superior Court by Elisabetta Bertucci, who alleges that “until the evening of May 18, 2020, Loto-Quebec’s Texas Hold’em poker platform had a serious defect unknown to the vast majority” of players.
The suit claims that players using iPads “and presumably any iOS device” could see other players’ hole cards after a hand was complete, regardless of whether or not a player chose to expose those hole cards. As such, the suit alleges that players using non-iOS devices were at a disadvantage because they lacked the ability to see these hole cards.
Bertucci, who has been playing on the site since 2010, claims to have discovered the glitch on May 13 when she played a tournament using an iPad for the first time. Bertucci then checked out the cash games and discovered the same flaw was present.
Bertucci called Espacejeux support and claims that a technician confirmed to her that the glitch existed. But five days later, the glitch hadn’t been patched, so Bertucci called back and spoke to a supervisor named ‘Carlos,’ after which the glitch was patched.
On May 21, Bertucci got an email from a Loto-Quebec rep who confirmed that “the incident affecting the poker hand history on OK Poker is now resolved.” The agent apologized for any “inconvenience” Bertucci may have suffered and offered her C$15 in compensation. Bertucci refused this offer, deeming it inadequate, given that she claims to have lost nearly C$18k (US$13,300) on the site since July 2010.
The suit claims that Loto-Quebec deceived its poker players by failing to provide “a secure platform that respects the integrity and rules” of the game. The suit further alleges that Loto-Quebec failed to inform players of this iOS glitch and also failed to change all players’ user names to prevent their hand histories from being analyzed in this fashion.
Bertucci’s suit notes that GVC Holdings’ PartyPoker site recently suffered an integrity breach and the site responded by changing the usernames of all players in order “to level the playing field.”
Bertucci’s lawyers at LPC Avocat are inviting all individuals who until May 18 paid any sum of money to play Texas Hold’em on Espace-jeux or OK Poker to add their names to the suit. The suit seeks reimbursement of all moneys paid to play on the poker site, plus punitive damages of C$300 per player and an order forcing the platforms to allow users to change their screen-names.
A Loto-Quebec spokesperson told Le Journal de Quebec that the monopoly was “aware of the allegations” but declined further comment. Loto-Quebec is scheduled to release its fiscal Q4/FY2019-20 earnings report sometime in August.
