Lesson overview
Bot Detection and Collusion Ethics
How to recognize the patterns and how to report them
Read this introduction, then sign in to continue the full lesson and exercises.
Inside the full lesson
You're playing online. Two players at your table only ever 3-bet each other and never seem to lose to each other. Is that collusion?
In the full lesson, you work through this scenario with interactive examples.
Cheating in poker is rare but real. Bots, RTA (real-time assistance), and collusion exist at every stake. As a player, you have two responsibilities: recognize the patterns so you can adjust or leave, and report when you're reasonably sure something's off. This lesson is the pattern catalog and the reporting playbook.
What you’ll learn
- The 4 most common bot/RTA patterns
- The 3 most common collusion patterns
- When to adjust, when to leave, and when to report
From the full lesson
Bot patterns
Referenced activities and other examples are available in the full lesson after sign-in.
Bots and RTA-assisted players have signatures different from human play.
1. Suspiciously consistent timing. Humans vary their think time. Bots act in narrow windows (e.g., always 2.5-4 seconds). RTA players sometimes have the opposite — long pauses on every decision while they consult software.
From the full lesson
Collusion patterns
Referenced activities and other examples are available in the full lesson after sign-in.
Collusion is two or more players sharing information or coordinating actions.
1. Whipsawing (the pump-and-bluff). Two players take turns raising a third player. One raises preflop, the other 3-bets, the third folds. Pattern repeats with the roles reversed. Goal: extract value from the third player's folds without either colluder risking real chips against the other.
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