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Message: [QUOTE="dmorris68, post: 1311197, member: 40397"] Installing such an application under the premise of using it as a cheat could certainly allow your hole card data (any any other personal data) to be gathered and transmitted, as with any other malware that gathers and transmits your personal information surreptitiously. And in fact, if enough people could be tricked into installing this software, it could actually work as a cheat by broadcasting everyone's hole cards to everyone else running the cheat. Which of course means the only hole cards you'd see are those of other cheats, and vice versa. So while I don't disagree with the point of your post (I haven't read your article), the example of clicking an e-mail removal link and having the software silently installed is a bit overhyped. While not entirely beyond the realm of possibility, it just cannot happen on a wide enough scale, if practically at all, to be worthwhile. With virtually any modern browser and OS, particularly those that are regularly updated (ala Windows Update, for example, which I hope most folks keep enabled), simply clicking a link will almost never result in an invisible software installation. The user would see a prompt to download/install and would have to confirm it. Most browser exploits that come from malware links are of the Javascript variety, that use hidden script or browser plugins/addons to grab passwords and other person info that is typed into the browser. But it doesn't install software that works outside of a browser. Almost all such malware that does install itself, makes its way onto user's PC's by tricking them into confirming the download/install, for example in this case by making them think they're installing a poker cheat. Or the most common method, by telling them that a virus has been detected, and if they'll just click here, it can be cleaned "for free." Either way, the user is complicit in the act beyond just clicking a removal link in an e-mail. And yes, before someone points it out, there have been browser or OS exploits, usually due to buffer under/overflow vulnerabilities, that allowed links to malicious websites to take some degree of control over the user's PC. But they're generally very rare, highly publicized, and quickly patched. The number of systems vulnerable to such an exploit, especially one targeted at a particular niche of users (e.g. poker players), would be so small as to be almost not worth the effort of setting up such a marketing effort. There would be so few poker players caught up in this that the usefulness of having their hole cards transmitted would be pretty close to nil. It's not like banking information or site passwords, which is universal to the point that you could always manage to hit enough people to make it worthwhile. In summary, it is entirely possible and believable that such "cheat" programs would themselves be malware designed to reveal a player's hole cards (and possibly all sorts of other personal data). But it would be highly unlikely to propagate to any useful degree by way of a "remove me" e-mail link. [/QUOTE]

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