World Game Protection Conference set for 15th annual gathering in Las Vegas

February 19, 2020 11:19 AM
  • Buck Wargo, CDC Gaming Reports
February 19, 2020 11:19 AM
  • Buck Wargo, CDC Gaming Reports

The 2020 World Game Protection Conference will look back with 20-20 hindsight at what’s been learned during the last 20 years that can be applied today, while also looking ahead to artificial intelligence and the need to deal with organized slot cheating.

Story continues below

The 15th conference, which runs from March 23 through March 26 at the Tropicana Las Vegas, connects people responsible for observing, detecting, reporting, investigating and acting on undesirable activity. It is bringing in several top-level casino security, surveillance and public-safety experts as speakers. Approximately 600 people are expected to attend.

Willy Allison, the conference founder, said the show is about connecting industry people to share intelligence about the biggest problems casinos face, which include violence and criminal enterprises. The expansion of gaming over the last 20 years has led to a lot of new global jurisdictions, and there’s still a learning curve for them to see “the dark side of the casino industry that aren’t written in the marketing manuals,” Allison said.

“We have 24 speakers and more than 50 percent of them are in the industry and not consultants and vendors,” Allison said. “We keep it real, and these are people on the ground floor. We want to learn from the knowledge in the room. We will have sessions on issues that have become a bigger threat to casinos, such as money laundering, slot scams, and the digitization of our games that brings in hackers. We will have panel discussions to talk about how we can resolve these things. Instead of taking a gun to a knife fight, we talk about how we stay up with the bad guys as cyber threats and digital threats have become more of an issue.”

The conference will feature a symposium on slots, with the idea that, “except for slot technicians, no one in the casino is watching electronic games,” Allison said. “Casinos have been exposed for their complacency, lack of controls and surveillance blind spots when it comes to protecting slots from high-tech cheating gangs,” he added.

“We feel that’s a neglected area in supervising and monitoring in our business. We rely on the manufacturers doing the right thing, but unfortunately, they don’t give us much information. So we need to come up with ways in which we can monitor electronic games better.”

Last November, Allison wrote an article in his newsletter about who’s watching slots and he’s never had a bigger response. Everyone agrees, he insists, that the industry has been neglecting slots for years in terms of surveillance, monitoring and staff reduction.

“There are big opportunities for hackers and cheats, because we tend to focus on cash on tables,” Allison said. “Russian hackers are continuing to invent ways to beat the machines. Now they can go online and take the live feed (from a casino) and put it into their algorithm and develop a system that times the jackpot without stepping into a casino. Nobody is thinking about this, because everybody is trying to get an edge.”

Allison said he’s shocked that casinos are now allowing people to live-stream their slot play in casinos. Generally, the industry now allows cameras and video in the casino, but hackers can record and reverse engineer to beat the slots.

“Casinos have been told about these threats, but they think the opportunity to gain more exposure on social networks is worth the risk,” Allison said. “It’s easy for a surveillance department to monitor 30 to 40 table games. It’s not easy to monitor 3,000 slot machines. We have to fight digital crimes with digital weapons— algorithms and all that. The majority of the industry has been in denial and they admit now it’s a very neglected area. The worst thing is that in America, it represents about 70 percent of revenue for casinos.”

The conference will host a symposium on artificial intelligence and Allison said the industry “is on the cusp of a new era” with technology. Casinos are trying to work out the cost-to-benefit, but many haven’t thought about all the good it can do as well as the bad that’s been talked about in the media. Regulators are now asking questions about data privacy, he said.

“I have asked people in casinos that have artificial intelligence, such as facial recognition, how have they been using it and what is its success,” Allison said. “Unlike other conferences that focus on people talking about it, I focus on people walking it and putting it in.”

Darren Henderson, Asset Protection and Responsible Gambling Manager with Christchurch Casino in New Zealand, will talk about how facial recognition is being used to deter problem gamblers.

Tracy Tye, Director of Surveillance Technical Compliance and Regulations at the Baha Mar resort in the Bahamas, will talk about how facial recognition is helping detect money laundering.

Catherine Clark, Vice President of Game Protection and Integrity for Galaxy Entertainment Group in Macau, will talk about how cameras and artificial-intelligence software are combating internal theft.

Henderson, Tye and Clark will also be part of a panel discussion on preparing the casino world for artificial intelligence.

“I think right now, we’re going through a stage where everyone from software designers and companies in Silicon Valley aren’t familiar with our industry, and I’m looking forward to hearing the end users talk about the technology,” Allison said.

This also marks the first time the conference will have a one-day, pre-conference, seminar training course in surveillance. The conference will focus on what has been learned around the world and everything people need to know about surveillance, from setting up systems to what threats should be prioritized.

For more information and to register go to https://www.worldgameprotection.com/register/.