Chance Kornuth joins poker blacklist scheme promoted by Alex Foxen

Chance Kornuth joins poker blacklist scheme promoted by Alex Foxen

Chance Kornuth has joined a poker blacklist initiative driven by Alex Foxen, the first to go public with some bold allegations against the 2021 GPI Global Poker Index and PokerGO Tour Player of the Year.

In a series of tweets, the newlywed Foxen wrote that Imsirovic is “a Texas Hold'em cheat known by almost everyone in the poker high stakes community.” He went on to say that his peers use real-time assistance (RTA) and multi-accounts online, and “pass the scoreboard” on the field during matches.

Gold bracelet winners show no mercy

Kornuth, who won his third WSOP bracelet last year and has $9.9 million in live tournament prize money, took to Twitter to lash out at the alleged cheater, echoing Foxen's statement, according to Hendon Mob. Kornuth asked the community and poker sites to blacklist those caught cheating.

When a poker site decides someone is cheating, they ban them, keep their identities secret, and put them in the dark.

— Chance Kornuth

He went on to write that multiple accounts and the use of RTA “make the probability of losing in a large sample range extremely low.” The media reached out to Justin Bonomo, who also tweeted similar allegations against Imsirovic and others at the high stakes, asking how much of an advantage he would give players using RTA.

“A huge advantage,” Bonomo said. “It depends on how comprehensive their tools are. If every point is known, it can easily turn a nobody into better than every non-cheater in the world. We have tools to solve every single point (in poker) individually. It's just a matter of compiling thousands of these solutions and taking out a good piece of software to see the right solution.”

Kornuth then made some bold allegations against some specific players. He wrote that he had seen “multiple sources” telling him there were hundreds of players on the banned list, “but the only ones I'm personally sure of are Jake Schindler and Ali Imsirovic.”

The WSOP event team contacted the gaming website, which provided the following statement.

“Due to privacy concerns, we cannot comment on any individual players. We take all issues related to the integrity of our games with the utmost seriousness, and our security team is constantly working to maintain the integrity of all our games. We regularly employ various security measures, including permanent bans on player accounts and the confiscation and reallocation of funds.”

The WSOP bracelet winner then pondered that the recent lack of new young pros in the high stakes scene could be the reason, as he wrote, “so many players like Jake Schindler and Ali Imsirovic are using RTA online. and multiple accounts cheating them in high-level matches”.

Should he play?

This Thursday, PokerGO will host a $25,000 heads-up event in Las Vegas, where the 32 best players will battle it out for the $400,000 first-place prize. One of the contestants will be Imsirovic, and not everyone is happy about it.

The tournament will run from April 21 to 23, and if Foxen and Imsirovic make it through the first four rounds unscathed, they could meet in the final round. This is sure to be a high-profile game.