In the space of a short two years, the popularity of AI has increased almost exponentially, and it has been adopted by almost all industries. So, it is no surprise that it has been readily put to work in the technology-laden world of online gaming.
From helping to deliver more personalised experiences to players at online gaming to enhancing customer support and analysing playing metrics, AI has become a big tool for risk gaming operators. Gaming security has also become a big area where AI has flexed its muscles.
Gaming zones have historically been targeted by hackers and fraudsters, even long before the online industry took over. But, thanks to modern technological advances—including the transformative integration of AI—online risk gaming have been able to bolster their safeguards against bad actors.
Fraud detection
A lot of online enterprises worry about fraud, however, reading an Inclave guide can help you to gain extra insights into fraud detection across the vast number of games available at online zones.
Online risk gaming handle a lot of money going in and out of their systems daily, and they have to keep track of it all. Payments made online are secured through encryption protocols, but the worry for online gaming zones is over fraudsters who try to manipulate the system by using fake identifications and stolen cards.
This can lead to scenarios of money laundering, right under the noses of the online gaming venues, and it can happen in any number of ways—for example, funding a gambling account with a stolen card and then withdrawing the balance to a different destination.
AI can look for unusually large deposits that are out of the ordinary, or, conversely, look for a sudden burst of accounts being opened that have had similar deposit amounts go to them. To try and cut down on suspicion, instead of using one account for one big lump sum, fraudsters will attempt to spread the money across several fake accounts to lessen the risk of being detected.
AI is a great tool for online gaming as it can rapidly analyse transactional patterns on accounts, with constant monitoring looking for things out of the norm. Subtle clues are more likely to be spotted by AI than by any degree of human diligence.
Verification of account
Due to the concern over fraudulent accounts, account verification by genuine players at online gaming is very important. Proving who they say they are before an initial withdrawal can be made from the account not only ensures the transaction will end up going to the right financial account on the user’s end but also means the gaming venues know it’s dealing with a real person.
Real-time monitoring
A gaming tracks and monitors everything, but the volume of traffic and data is naturally high, and too much for human guards to watch. So, this is another big area of gaming security where AI excels because it can be used to monitor things in real-time and analyse the massive packets of information that arrive for anomalies.
AI will look for things like unusual betting patterns on everything from slots to the blackjack table, and it will be ready to hit an account with an automated red flag if anything out of the ordinary is detected. A good example of the layer of protection that AI offers is evidenced in the battle against collusion.
This is where fraudsters collude together, say over a game of poker, all using fake accounts. Those accounts funded with stolen cards will deliberately lose, directing all the money to the one main fraudulent ‘winning’ player/account. It’s a way to legitimise and clean the dirty money that has been used to fund the accounts in the first place.
But AI can be used for such acts of collusion by tracking patterns on the fly, which is part of its role in keeping things fair for all players.
What else could AI do?
Biometric player verification is a newer branch of security technology that is a bit like clicking on a Captcha box to verify you are human—however, that’s actually more about the mouse movement being tracked than whether the selections are correct. Humans don’t move their mouse or tracker in perfectly straight lines, which is what bots do.
A similar concept can be used by AI to monitor mouse movements and swipes at an online gaming. It would likely be quite easy for AI to differentiate between a human player and a bot. Why could this be important? Human players have their patterns of play, things like reaction times on a touchscreen and time taken between plays.
If an account suddenly saw spins happening at a much faster rate, for example, that could indicate the account has been compromised and a bot is playing.
How AI helps player security
AI doesn’t just work for the gaming’s safety, there’s a lot of work into keeping players safe—from overseeing secure transactions to enhancing account security and even helping with spotting problem gambling. Gambling comes with risks, and if AI detects a player suddenly having longer and longer playing sessions or a sudden spike in deposits, it can step in and offer recommendations. This is all part of pattern behaviour identification, and AI is strong enough to differentiate between fraudulent attempts and people in need of assistance.
