Poker Trackers

There are wide ranging policies over the use of poker trackers across the internet, and with some websites now allowing multiple accounts, their future is still far from clear

Last week watchers of the Sky Poker television channel will have seen the issue of poker trackers raised. There was an in depth discussion over whether they have become an indispensible tool for serious players of online poker, or whether their use is just another form of cheating.

A poker tracker will import hand histories from poker sites and store this information in a database for later analysis. Using a tracker you can find out everything that happened in a poker session and use the information to understand your own play and your opponents. A tracker gives you the ability to take real times notes on the way people play which in turn allows you to built up a large profile on them so that next time you meet you will be at a distinct advantage. At the same time it allows you to take a good look at your own style of play, you can save every single hand you’ve played across multiple poker rooms, examine the statistics and see how you can improve upon your game.

Across the web there are varying policies on poker trackers at different online poker rooms. Sky Poker was advocating their use however; they do not allow the use of poker trackers by players playing at their website. Because poker trackers are such powerful tools and in some ways will allow players to see into the mind of their opponents a number of poker websites have begun allowing their players to start using multiple identities, this allows them to hide their true identity from the other players.
Until very recently this practice was known as ‘multiple accounting’ and was completely forbidden by the terms and conditions of poker site. If players were caught with multiple accounts they usually faced a suspension from the site and in some cases a life time ban. Players could also face having their accounts confiscated for using multiple accounts; however, the introduction of poker trackers has causes sites to start reviewing the policies.

At the moment most poker sites will not allow you to change your screen name, but there are some that do. One of the largest poker sites which permit this is Cake Poker, there you are permitted to change your screen name once every seven days.