Finding Value With NFL Futures

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Finding Value With NFL FuturesOne of the biggest misconceptions about professional gamblers is that they are all top-notch handicappers. They aren't. But they do one thing far better than the average bettor. They know how to shop for lines.
Getting the best available betting lines can often make the difference between a winning season and a losing one. Those who bet for a living are quick to acknowledge that fact. If you want to see the value in shopping for lines, look no farther than the NFL futures market for odds to win the 2009 Super Bowl.

A number of smart bettors will typically avoid placing futures bets, as the house typically has an estimated 30- to 50-percent advantage over bettors. But for those willing to shop for the best odds, those percentages can be drastically reduced.
What we'll do here is look at the odds to win the 2009 Super Bowl from four well-known sportsbooks - Bodog, Intertops, Olympic, and Wagerweb. We'll compare the odds for each team and point out which sportsbook the player should wager at.
NOTE: Odds can change at any time depending on bets received by the sportsbook. You usually get the best odds by acting early, as most sportsbooks will lower the odds on one team, without raising the odds on others to make up the difference.
Odds to Win the 2009 Super Bowl

Arizona Cardinals 30.5-1 to 50-1
Three of our four sportsbooks have the Cardinals at 50-1 to win the Super Bowl, while Olympic has Arizona at just 30-.5-1 to bring home the big trophy, so obviously, Arizona should be bet at Intertops, Wagerweb, or Bodog.

Atlanta Falcons 100-1 to 165.5-1
None of the four sportsbooks gives the Falcons much of a chance to win the Super Bowl and its hard to blame them, as Atlanta figures to be a few years away from even competing for the playoffs. The worst odds on the Falcons are the 100-1 offered at Olympic, while bettors who place a bet at Wagerweb will get the best odds, 165.5-1.

Baltimore Ravens 50-1 to 75-1
The Baltimore Ravens are another team that shows a good-sized difference in odds depending on which sportsbook a wager is placed through. Wagerweb offers the best odds on Baltimore at 75-1.

Buffalo Bills 48.5-1 to 80-1
The best place to bet the Buffalo Bills is Intertops, where bettors can get a lofty 80-1, while Wagerweb and Olympic are both offering the Bills at 50-1 or less. There is no reason to wager on Buffalo at either of those two books.

Carolina Panthers 40-1 to 52.5-1
Bodog and Olympic are both listing the Panthers at 40-1, while Intertops lists Carolina at 50-1 and Wagerweb is offering 52.5-1 odds. The spread range isn't nearly as great for Carolina as it is for a number of other teams.

Chicago Bears 35-1 to 40-1
There is a general consensus among all for of the sportsbooks here, as the odds difference is minimal for Chicago. The Bears' biggest challenge could be making the playoffs, as Green Bay and Minnesota also figure to be in the hunt for the division title and Wildcard spots.

Cincinnati Bengals 40-1 to 60-1
Those who like the Bengals should look to Wagerweb where they can find a hefty 60-1 on Carson Palmer and the boys. The Bengals are one of the most inconsistent teams in the league, but if they put things together, who knows?

Cleveland Browns 25-1 to 33-1
The Browns are getting a bit of respect among all of the different sportsbooks listed. The price range is fairly narrow, with Intertops having the best odds at 33-1.

Dallas Cowboys 6-1 to 8-1
The Cowboys are the favorites to make it to the Super Bowl from the NFC, but are only about the fourth choice to win the Super Bowl, as San Diego and the Colts have comparable odds. Intertops is where you'll find 8-1 odds.

Denver Broncos 40-1 to 50-1
The Broncos have fallen on some hard times and are now considered a sizable longshot to do anything in the postseason, if they get there at all. Wagerweb has the team at 50-1.

Detroit Lions 52.5-1 to 80-1
The Lions are one of the biggest longshots on the board, as the team appears to be in transition once again. Detroit is 80-1 at both Intertops and Wagerweb.

Green Bay 20-1 to 35.1
he Packers are still expected to do well without Brett Favre, as Aaron Rodgers is ready to take the helm. He has done well in spot duty and has patiently waited for his chance. Wagerweb is where Cheeseheads should look to wager with odds of 35.5-1.

Houston Texans 60-1 to 80-1
The Houston Texans are another team still looking for an identity, thus the lofty odds, which are pretty well deserved. Wagerweb is the place to bet the Texans at 80-1.

Indianapolis Colts 7-1 to 7.85-1
There's minimal difference in the odds on the Colts, as all four sportsbooks have the team between 7-1 and 7.85-1. The Colts, along with the Chargers, are expected to be the toughest test for New England. Wagerweb is where you can find 7.85-1 on Manning and crew.

Jacksonville Jaguars 10.15-1 to 14-1
The Jaguars are getting a good amount of respect from the sportsbooks. There is a bit of a price range on the team, with Intertops offering the best odds at 14-1.

Kansas City Chiefs 90-1 to 145.5-1
The Chiefs are another team that has fallen on hard times as of late. The once potent offense has dropped quite a bit, while the defense has gotten better, but not nearly enough. Wagerweb is where you'll find 145.5-1 odds.

Miami Dolphins 90-1 to 145.5-1
The Dolphins were clearly the worst team in the NFL last season, so it isn't surprising to see them listed here. Only the Falcons are listed as a longer shot than Miami. Wagerweb is the book offering the 145.5-1 odds.

Minnesota Vikings 18-1 to 25-1
The Minnesota Vikings are getting a bit of respect from the sportsbooks and have the potential to be a very dangerous team if Tarvaris Jackson continues to show the improvement expected of him. Intertops is where you'll find the 25-1 odds.

New England Patriots 3-1 to 3.55-1
The Patriots are once again favored to win the Super Bowl, as well they should be. The price range is pretty slim for the Pats, with Olympic narrowly offering the best odds at 3.55-1, with Sportsbook right behind at 3.5-1.

New Orleans Saints 16.5-1 to 25-1
The Saints are another of the teams in the NFC that have potential to pull a few surprises. If the defense steps up a notch, the Saints have a good enough offense to make a playoff run. Wagerweb is where you'll find the 25-1 odds.

New York Giants 14-1 to 22.5-1
The Giants aren't given a great chance of repeating as Super Bowl champions, but they are certainly one of the favorites in the NFC. It's difficult to repeat and things certainly fell the right way for New York last year. Wagerweb is where you'll find the 22.5-1 odds.

New York Jets 35-1 to 105.5-1
The New York Jets hold the distinction of having the largest difference in odds of any team, being a paltry 35-1 at one sportsbook and a lofty 105.5-1 at Wagerweb.

Oakland Raiders 50-1 to 100-1
The Raiders are another team with a large gap in odds. Those wishing to back the Raiders should look to Wagerweb and the 100-1 odds being offered.

Philadelphia Eagles 20-1 to 25-1
The Eagles are another one of the NFC teams that have the potential for a deep playoff run, but it's a matter of how things fall into place for them. Wagerweb is where you'll find the 25-1 odds.

Pittsburgh Steelers 14-1 to 25-1
There is a bit of a price range on the Steelers, who are just a few years removed from winning the Super Bowl. Pittsburgh is one of those teams who can beat anybody on a given day. Bodog and Wagerweb each have Pittsburgh at 25-1.

San Diego Chargers 7-1 to 8-1
The Chargers are seen as one of the three main contenders from the AFC, with New Egland and the Colts the other two. San Diego does have the luxury of playing in a relatively week division, which should guarantee a solid playoff seed. Bodog is where you'll find 8-1.

San Francisco 49ers 52.5-1 to 80-1
The 49ers made some improvements last season, but still have plenty of question marks heading into the new season. Wagerweb and Intertops both have San Francisco at 80-1.

Seattle 25-1 to 35.5-1
The Seahawks are another team that has the advantage of playing a relatively week division, which should be enough to get them into the playoffs. That's the first step towards the Super Bowl, which is one reason the odds are somewhat low for Seattle. Olympic is the place to get the 35.5-1.

St. Louis Rams 60.5-1 to 80-1
Defense has never been a strong suit for the Rams, even when St. Louis was a Super Bowl contender, but this unit was just horrendous last year. The Rams have some offensive talent, but giving up 438 points isn't going to get the job done. Wagerweb has the Rams at 80-1.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers 35-1 to 52.5-1Tampa Bay quietly allowed fewer points than any other team in the NFC last season and figure to be strong defensively once again. Wagerweb is where you'll find the 52.5-1 odds.

Tennessee Titans 35-1 to 42.5-1The Titans will need Vince Young to play up to his potential to be considered a serious Super Bowl threat. While Young improved in some areas last year, his interceptions were up and his touchdowns were down. That's never a good thing for your quarterback. Wagerweb has the 42.5-1 odds.

Washington Redskins 35-1 to 52.5-1Washington was a bit of a disappointment last year, despite making the playoffs, as the team has the talent to do better. It will be interesting to see how Washington responds to new head coach Jim Zorn. Wagerweb is where you'll find the 52.5-1 odds.

Remember, these are the odds at just the four listed sportsbooks. If you can mange the time, don't be afraid to shop for lines at other places. As the old sports gambling adage goes, "What you save is what you earn."

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A Little Lady Takes on the Big Boys in Preakness

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They’ll be a new player in Baltimore for the 134th Preakness. She’s the likely favorite – Rachel Alexandra.
All that’s formally needed is the $100,000 supplemental fee to make the restricted 14-horse field as long as there’s a slot open. So far, a dozen colts and the Kentucky Derby winning gelding Mine That Bird plan to race on Saturday.
Both new owner Jess Jackson and trainer Steve Asmussen said last week that if Rachel Alexandra continued to do well she would run against the boys.
On Sunday, she did. The daughter of Medaglia d’Oro posted a sharp 48 2/5 breezing four furlongs at Churchill Downs, galloping out five furlongs in 1:02.
She was full of energy entering the backstretch, observers told the Daily Racing Form, and by the time she passed the half-mile pole she was in full flight.

The filly won the Kentucky Oaks by an amazing 20 ¼ lengths for her fifth consecutive victory and her fourth straight triple-digit speed figure. That’s just one less than all likely Preakness runners combined.
In addition, jockey Calvin Borel chose to ride her over Mine That Bird, but was aboard the son of Birdstone Monday when he breezed four furlongs in 49 1/5 at Churchill Downs.
Alexandra the Great is so feared that a couple of owners had considered running more horses to keep her on the sidelines. Thoroughbred Times first reported that Mark Allen, co-owner of Mine That Bird, and Ahmed Zayat, owner of Derby runner-up Pioneer of the Nile, planned “to enter at least one additional horse.”
The announcement triggered such an avalanche of comments, mostly negative, that the TVG racing network contacted Zayat on Sunday. After thoroughly reviewing the situation, Zayat said by phone he would not run any other horse. Later, Allen also said he had changed his mind.
Pimlico oddsmaker Frank Carulli had already announced he would make Rachel Alexandra the morning line favorite. The last two fillies favored in the Preakness were Derby champs Genuine Risk in 1980 and Winning Colors in ‘88.
Genuine Risk finished second to Codex while Winning Colors was third to Risen Star. Four of the 52 that triumphed at Pimlico were Florcarline, ‘03; Whimsical, ‘06; Rhine Maiden, ‘15; and Nellie Morses, ‘24. You could call ‘15 the Year of the Filly because Regret took the Derby.
Genuine Risk was the first of two fillies to start all three legs of the Triple Crown, finishing second in the Belmont, while Winning Colors ran sixth.
Horses exiting the Derby hold a distinct advantage: 21 of the past 23 captured the Preakness. The only exceptions were newcomers Red Bullet in ‘00 and Bernardini in ‘06, returning $14.40 and $12.20, respectively.
The longest longshot in Preakness history was Master Derby in ‘75, returning $48 on the front end. In the last 14 years, four Derby winners paid more: Thunder Gulch in ‘95, $51, Charismatic, ‘99, $64.60; Giacomo, ‘05, $102.60; and Mine That Bird, $103.20.
Seven Derby champs also won the Preakness since ‘93 when the last runner-up scored — Prairie Bayou. That bodes ill for Pioneer of the Nile.
Other Derby runners headed to Pimlico: Musket Man, third; Papa Clem, fourth; General Quarters, 10th; Friesan Fire, 18th; and Flying Private, 19th and last.



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Frank’s bill doesn’t include sports betting

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All of you WagerWeb.com customers in the United States who were hoping that new legislation introduced by Massachusetts Democrat Barney Frank would make online sports betting legal in the U.S. are going to be disappointed.
It only relates to online poker and games of the sort.
Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, and Peter King, R-N.Y., unveiled the legislation Wednesday that would basically repeal the 2006 UIGEA that was rammed through Congress while hidden on a port security bill. The law currently prohibits U.S. credit card companies and banks from processing bets placed on online gambling Web sites.
The Frank bill would allow the Treasury to license and revoke licenses of Internet gambling Web sites. It also would also allow the Treasury to “assess” license holders for the costs of background checks and investigations of Web sites applying for the license.
“The government should not interfere with people’s liberty unless there is a good reason,” Frank said. “This is, I believe, the single biggest example of an intrusion into the principle that people should be free to do things on the Internet. It’s clearly the case that gambling is an activity that can be done offline but not online.”

But why not allow betting on the NFL, NCAA football, etc.? Well, the NFL, for one, is a powerful lobbying force in Washington. And any bill that included full sports gambling would have no chance to pass. Even this one has no better than maybe a 25 percent chance. No similar bill has been proposed in the Senate, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has said that he opposes Internet gambling.
Michael Waxman of the Safe and Secure Internet Gambling Initiative, a lobbying group, told Covers.com that political realities limited Frank to legislation that is at least a step in the right direction.
“We’re disappointed that this version of the legislation does not include online gambling,” says Waxman.
“We think that Americans should not be prohibited from placing a bet on the team of their choice. (But) Congressman Frank obviously felt that he needed to file a bill that had a chance of passage.”
Among the safeguards in the bill is that any Internet gambling operator would be required to ensure an individual placing a bet is of legal age and physically located in that jurisdiction.
If the Frank bill does pass, banks would no longer have to report credit card transactions between U.S. residents and web sites that offer poker and other casino games. Thus in reality, you could still bet on other sports on that site with the impetus falling on the site on whether to accept those bets.


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Chuck Daly died, he was 78

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Chuck Daly, who coached the Dream Team to the Olympic gold medal in 1992 after winning back-to-back NBA championships with the Detroit Pistons, has died. He was 78.
He died Saturday morning in Jupiter, Fla., with his family by his side, the Pistons said. The team announced in March the Hall of Fame coach was being treated for pancreatic cancer.
Daly was renowned for his ability to create harmony out of diverse personalities at all levels of the game, whether they were Ivy Leaguers at Pennsylvania, Dream Teamers Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley, or Pistons as dissimilar as Dennis Rodman and Joe Dumars.
“It’s a players’ league. They allow you to coach them or they don’t,” Daly once said. “Once they stop allowing you to coach, you’re on your way out.”
Daly was voted one of the 10 greatest coaches of the NBA’s first half-century in 1996, two years after being inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame. He was the first coach to win both NBA and Olympic titles.
“I think Chuck understood people as well as basketball,” Dumars told The Associated Press in 1995. “It’s a people business.”
On Saturday, Dumars called Daly “a special coach, but more importantly he was a special human being.”
Doug Collins, a former Pistons and Chicago Bulls coach, lauded Daly for his class and dignity.
“He was a mentor and a friend,” Collins said. “He taught me so much and was always so supportive of me and my family. I loved him and will miss him.”
Daly had a golden touch at the Barcelona Games with the likes of Magic Johnson, Jordan, Larry Bird and Barkley, using a different lineup every game.
“I played against Chuck’s teams throughout the NBA for a lot of years. He always had his team prepared, he’s a fine coach,” Bird said shortly after Daly’s diagnosis became public.
“Chuck did a good job of keeping us together. It wasn’t about who scored the most points. It was about one thing: winning the gold medal.”
Daly humbled the NBA superstars by coaching a group of college players to victory in a controlled scrimmage weeks before the Olympics.
“I was the happiest man in the gym,” Daly said.
Daly also made the right moves for the Pistons, who were notorious for their physical play with Bill Laimbeer and Rick Mahorn leading the fight, Rodman making headlines and Hall of Fame guards Isiah Thomas and Dumars lifting the team to titles in 1989 and 1990.
“He did an unbelievable job of taking a bunch of different personalities and molding them into a team,” Mahorn said.
Thomas, the former New York Knicks coach and president who now coaches at Florida International University, added: “I can’t explain in words how much he gave me as a player and a man. … This is an immeasurable loss for the NBA and the entire basketball world.”
Former Piston John Salley gave Daly the nickname Daddy Rich for his impeccably tailored suits. The National Basketball Coaches’ Association created pins with the initials “CD” that many coaches and broadcasters are wearing as it dedicates this postseason to Daly. The organization also established the Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award, which will be given annually.
Daly had a career regular-season record of 638-437 in 13 NBA seasons. In 12 playoff appearances, his teams went 75-51. He left Detroit as the Pistons’ leader in regular-season and playoff victories.
“Chuck left a lasting impression with everyone he met both personally and professionally and his spirit will live with all of us forever,” family and team spokesman Matt Dobek said.
Despite his success, Daly wasn’t part of a Coach of the Year presentation until he handed the trophy to then-Detroit coach Rick Carlisle in 2002.
“This is as close as I’ve ever been to that thing,” Daly said, looking at the Red Auerbach Trophy.
Born July 20, 1930, in St. Marys, Pa., Charles Jerome Daly played college ball at St. Bonaventure and Bloomsburg. After two years in the military, he coached for eight seasons at Punxsutawney (Pa.) High School and then spent six years as an assistant at Duke.
Succeeding Bob Cousy as coach at Boston College, Daly coached the Eagles to a 26-24 record over two seasons and then spent seven seasons at Penn, leading the Quakers to the Ivy League championship in 1972-75.
Daly joined the NBA coaching ranks in 1978 as an assistant under Billy Cunningham in Philadelphia. His first head coaching job was with Cleveland, but he was fired after the Cavaliers went 9-32 the first half of the 1981-82 season.
In 1983, Daly took over a Detroit team that had never had two straight winning seasons and led the Pistons to nine straight. He persuaded Rodman, Thomas, Dumars, Mahorn and Laimbeer to play as a unit and they responded with championships in 1989 and 1990.
Far from being intimidated by the Pistons’ Bad Boys image, Daly saw the upside of it.
“I’ve also had players who did not care,” he said a decade later. “I’d rather have a challenging team.”
After leaving Detroit, Daly coached the New Jersey Nets for two seasons and led them to the playoffs both times.
He left broadcasting to return to the bench 1997 with the Orlando Magic and won 74 games over two seasons, then retired at 68 because he was weary of the travel. Daly joined the Vancouver Grizzlies as a senior adviser in 2000. In retirement, he split time between residences in Jupiter, Fla., and suburban Detroit.
The Pistons retired No. 2 in 1997 to honor Daly’s two NBA titles.
“Without you, there wouldn’t be us,” Mahorn told the coach during the ceremony.
Daly is survived by his wife, Terry, daughter Cydney and grandchildren Sebrina and Connor.
Associated Press Writer Jim Irwin in Detroit and AP Sports Writers Cliff Brunt in Indianapolis and Tim Reynolds in Miami contributed to this report.

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How a Bookmaker and a Whiz Kid Took On a DDOS-based Online Extortion Attack PART II

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Hackers create zombies by scanning for exposed systems that they can manipulate remotely. Often these are home and office broadband users. (Lately, existing bot networks have been found scanning for more computers to turn into bots when they're not launching attacks of their own—akin to an army recruiting its soldiers in peacetime. One security consultant said he connected an unsecured computer to the Internet to see what would happen, and it was recruited within three minutes.) Hackers can also insert their attack code through phishing, spyware, viruses and social engineering. Universities have long been popular spots for creating zombies because of the number of easily accessible, unsecured public computers. With a zombie network in place, the only issue left is scale. The more zombies on a network, and the more aggregate upstream bandwidth they have, the swifter and more severe havoc they can wreak. Several hundred computers could generate 100MB of traffic, enough to knock a small network offline. A 10,000-computer bot network could deliver a 1Gb attack, enough to knock anyone offline who hasn't installed some rudimentary anti-DDoS infrastructure. Some experts believe that right now different sets of hackers are engaged in an arms race to see who can build the biggest zombie network. Not for bragging rights, but for renting out the networks to anyone who wants to launch an attack, the raw capitalist idea being that the biggest network will generate the best rental business. Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2003: Running Out of Time The extortionists' e-mail that arrived on this morning demonstrated that they were losing whatever patience they had: [all typos sic] "I told you that if you try and f*** with us that your site will be down forever.... The excuse that you were in the hospital does not matter to me. So here are your choices: 1) You have until 4pm est today to send us our $40K. 2) You have until 4pm est Wednesday to send us $50K if you can not send the $40K today. 3) You do not pay and your site will be down for 4 days starting Thursday and it will cost you $75K to come back up Monday. 4) You do nothing and do not respond to this email within an hour and we will make sure you are down forever...." Richardson was panicked. He can't remember precisely when—the entire week has blurred in his memory—but by this time, he had reported the crime to the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit (NHTCU) in Scotland Yard. According to an NHTCU spokeswoman, the unit had already opened a similar investigation with a British gaming site called CanBet.
According to Richardson and Lyon, the NHTCU encouraged Richardson to wire two extortion payments of a few thousand dollars each to separate Western Union offices in Eastern Europe. The NHTCU wanted to nab anyone who showed up to take the cash. (NHTCU won't confirm this; the spokeswoman said the unit does not discuss investigative tactics.) Richardson agreed, but for a different reason: He wanted his site back up. "I knew another person [in the industry] who was successful getting back online by sending three or four small payments like this," Richardson says, "and those guys didn't even have a solution to the problem when they paid. I knew Barrett was getting closer and closer to a solution. So I sent the payments, thinking maybe I can get a good week out of this." But no one took the bait. After about two weeks, Richardson pulled the money back. Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2003: Barrett's Big Bet From Sacramento, Lyon instructed the PureGig engineers who would turn on his system 630 miles southeast, in Phoenix. Another 2,400 miles southeast from Phoenix, everyone at BetCris waited impatiently. Lyon's system intercepted traffic headed for BetCris's servers in Costa Rica, diverted it to his creation in Phoenix, scrubbed off the attack traffic and delivered legitimate traffic back to Costa Rica. It was designed to bar DDoS traffic from touching BetCris. If the system failed, it couldn't defend BetCris, and it wouldn't be able to send legitimate traffic to Costa Rica. But BetCris itself wasn't getting attacked. The system did a lot of other stuff too: monitoring, capacity planning, logging and analysis. It wasn't perfect. After it was installed, Lyon had to tweak routers on the network, install new versions of software and add capacity to his system. The extortionists kept changing attack vectors, and Lyon and his team kept tweaking. It was a constant battle, but Lyon was confident that the system would enable BetCris.com to stay online. Wilson at PureGig called Lyon's system "ingenious" not because it was unique—it was monitoring and filtering at a proxy location—but because Lyon's monitoring and filtering seemed to stop attacks better than any other effort he'd seen. But when it was first turned on, the extortionists stuffed too much traffic down its throat. Wilson recalls the math: "We had 100MB links to the DNS servers. We went from handling under 2MB per link to, all of a sudden, 600MB." That's six times a full load. Imagine Fenway Park, which holds about 35,000 people. Now imagine 200,000 people trying to get inside Fenway Park at one time. The DNS servers were overloaded, and Phoenix got tense. Costa Rica had been tense for nearly a week (as much as half a million dollars in lost revenue), but now BetCris was bordering on despair. Mickey Richardson lacked sleep, and he struggled to make decisions and lead. His IT staff was fracturing, feeling impotent as they watched the attacks and waited for Lyon. BetCris's small call center staff was getting abused around the clock by customers calling in to vent frustration and demand to know what the heck was going on. The simple task of creating a smart message about what was happening eluded Richardson. "You can't just have your call center staff tell people you were hacked," Richardson says, because it creates more questions than answers. At the same time, his decision not to pay the extortionists was affecting other wagering sites that shared the same ISP and were experiencing network problems. "I'm getting calls from friendly competitors saying, 'Look, Mickey, we paid. Just pay. We're going down because of you.'" He was running out of time and energy. Richardson remembers around this time having to update his staff—275 or so people who weren't entirely sure they'd have a job soon—and he couldn't even find words. He thought, "I wish they could read my mind because I'm too exhausted to explain it anymore. I don't have any answers." In hindsight, Richardson says, he would have spent more time preparing for these human issues attached to the crisis—decision making under pressure, keeping the staff together—and less time worrying about technical defenses. Yes, create those technical defenses and make sure you have a crisis response plan. But also focus more on issues like exhaustion and emotional distress, and how they can be handled. It was in this context that Richardson received an e-mail, at 11:12 a.m. It caused him to feel, for the first time, "blind fear." "I would like to thank you for not keeping your end of the deal and making this upcoming weekend an enjoyable one for me." The extortionists demanded $75,000, but then seemed to disregard the money. "I do not care how long I have to destroy your business and I will. You will learn the hard way that you do not make a deal and then f*** around with us.... Let the games begin." Richardson would soon learn they were not bluffing. They could destroy his business, and they were going to try. For BetCris to survive, Lyon's slapdash system in Phoenix, which was just starting to find its purchase, would have to stand up to the biggest DDoS attack any of them had ever seen.


The DNS servers that had overloaded in Phoenix were brought back online in a couple of hours, after Lyon and Wilson adapted some filtering scripts and increased the size of their network pipes. Lyon then spent Thanksgiving and Friday eating leftover turkey his girlfriend delivered and tweaking his system to absorb bigger DDoS attacks. On Friday, he believed it could handle a 1Gb attack, and he felt good about that. He assured a frayed Richardson that he'd never see an attack that big. It would take tens of thousands of zombie computers. Which is exactly what happened. It turns out the extortionists had more than 20,000 zombies. PureGig's data center suffered badly, which affected several of its ISP customers. PureGig decided to take Lyon's system offline to fix it. "The attack went to 1.5Gb, with bursts up to 3Gb. It wasn't targeted at one thing. It was going to routers, DNS servers, mail servers, websites. It was like a battlefield, where there's an explosion over here, then over there, then it's quiet, then another explosion somewhere else," says Lyon. "They threw everything they had at us. I was just in shock." Richardson recalls the attack: "So I have Barrett on the line, who I think is the second coming, and he says, 'Let me think about this. Give me some time.' And I say, 'OK, I don't want to pressure you. I have faith. But if you don't fix it, I'm out of business.'" Why Online Extortion Works It was never supposed to have gotten to this point; Richardson was supposed to have paid long ago. The extortionists expertly optimized the chances of it. To ensure a quick, quiet transaction, the extortionists did what all extortionists (in the physical or online world) do: They exploited the problem of the commons. An ecological principle, the problem of the commons states that people will act in self-interest if it profits them in the short term, even if that act will hurt everyone, including themselves, in the long term. Every act, every threat, every negotiation tactic, every single move extortionists make is designed to make paying the protection fee not only appealing, but in fact, the smartest business decision you can make in the short term, even if you know in the long run that you haven't stopped the problem at all. Thus, extortionists attack when it hurts the target the most; they ask for $10,000 to $100,000 (generally considered the sweet spot of extortionist profitability versus victim willingness to pay, depending on the size of the victim company).


In BetCris's case, the extortionists revealed they were Eastern European, which would make them hard to find, never mind prosecute. Online crime laws are weaker in Eastern Europe than in the United States and the desire to enforce them weaker still (and the FBI wouldn't get involved with offshore gaming sites being extorted from overseas). The online version of extortion provides unique advantages (relative anonymity, low probability of prosecution, lots of easy targets, diminished chance of physical violence) that have made it a highly lucrative business alternative for bad guys. BetCris was just another easy target. What the extortionists didn't count on was the unlikely confluence of Richardson's resolve, Lyon's ingenuity and an ISP that would provide them a place to fight back. Friday, Dec. 12, 2003: BetCris Wins the War of Attrition The extortionists must have screamed "Hooy na ny!" or some other Russian expletive after their blitzkrieg, when Lyon "got the chemistry down" and managed to absorb the massive amounts of attack traffic and get PureGig and BetCris back up and running. Lyon assumed the bad guys would come back with something bigger, as hard as that was to imagine, so he set out to scale up his system "for whatever was next, a 6Gb attack or something." But for the next week, the attack stayed steady at around 1Gb. BetCris, Lyon and PureGig had entered a war of attrition. The extortionists would find a way to kick Lyon's system, Lyon and Lebumfacil would tweak it and get back up. Cat and mouse. "Attack, counterattack, back and forth," Lebumfacil says. "It was 24-by-7 monitoring for two weeks." Wilson and PureGig stopped noticing any of this because the attacks had been segregated from PureGig's other traffic. And then, suddenly, the attacks stopped. At 8:46 a.m. on Friday, Dec. 12, two weeks after the assault that nearly put him out of business and three weeks after he first read the words "Your site is under attack," Richardson received an e-mail: "Dear Mickey, I tried getting to your site today and I could not. I thought with all the money you spent you would not have these problems anymore. I guess you wasted your money instead of keeping your word. Good luck. P.S. I bet you feel real stupid that you did not keep your word. I figure by now you have lost 5 times what we asked and by the end of the year your decision will cost you more than 20 times what we asked."
Richardson knew this was an admission of defeat, even if it was disguised as braggadocio. His site was up. The extortionists couldn't get to it because they were blocked. He hadn't paid them a dime. They made no more threats. They couldn't because they couldn't back them up with action. The extortionists had lost. And yet, the e-mail was not far off. Richardson figures it cost him a million dollars in lost revenue and IT investments to win this war. "It was worth it," he says. "I just didn't know it would take a couple years off my life." "It was amazing we made that system work against that attack," Lyon says. "It was a wake-up call on how good the bad guys had gotten." And Lyon knows the bad guys have gotten even better since. They've built zombie networks of 35,000 machines, capable of delivering a steady stream of 3Gb traffic. Peter Rendell, CEO of Top Layer Networks, which makes intrusion prevention and anti-DDoS hardware, says he expects botnets to pass 50,000 machines (and 4Gb to 5Gb) by the end of this year. It's an arms race, as defenses scale, then offenses scale, though Lyon is convinced the defenses have far outpaced what extortionists can throw at them. But the bad guys have a response. Extortionists have encrypted DoS attack scripts and have put them on peer-to-peer networks, making criminals who use them nearly impossible to track or contain. They're registering domains and then attacking those domains, only those domains are redirected to other targets. "The only way to stop that is to delete the domain," Lyon says, "and that's not something you can just do." Lyon stopped an attack but certainly didn't stop the problem. Still, he wouldn't learn of all this until later, after he decided to start a business and, as he did with Don Best, track down the BetCris extortionists. At that moment, though, after the extortionists admitted defeat, he was ready to relax. He booked a vacation in San Jose, Costa Rica, for New Year's. Finally, he'd meet the people he saved and celebrate with them. New Year's, 2004: Visit to an Online Gaming Hotbed Costa Rica is about the size of West Virginia, bookended by Nicaragua to the northwest and Panama to the southeast on the Central American isthmus. With coastlines on both the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea, and mountainous terrain inland, Costa Rica sits along the Ring of Fire, so volcanoes and earthquakes are native. Political strife is not. The CIA calls Costa Rica a "Central American success story."
Lured by its stability, BetCris located there in 1993. Richardson joined as a "utility man" in 1996. Back then, the business wasn't online, it was a call center. BetCris's call center once employed more than 500 operators at peak hours, but the number dwindled as the business moved online. Today, maybe 30 operators will man a call center at peak hours, or during an extortion crisis. As the Internet took off, so did San Jose as an offshore gaming mecca, for several reasons. The government encouraged the industry to expand its economy. (BetCris supports an industry group to lobby local politicians.) Also, the people are educated, with an excellent work ethic, Richardson says. Costa Rica has a 96 percent literacy rate. More high-level employees at gaming companies are Costa Ricans, including all of BetCris's accounting staff and 90 percent of its managers. The other reason gaming companies swarmed here is, of course, because it's not the United States, where gambling laws are difficult to negotiate. Today, hundreds of offshore gaming companies, most of them online ventures, operate from San Jose. In BetCris's seven-story headquarters alone, Richardson says, there are 10 such enterprises, two software companies and a telecom company—pretty much offering everything you need to get started in the online gambling business in one building. The competition is mostly friendly. Richardson says it's not unusual to bump into competitors at a restaurant and join them for dinner. The valley that makes up the San Jose metropolitan area holds almost half the country's 4 million people. Richardson says the valley gets blistering hot, and downtown San Jose is "undesirable." But BetCris, and most of the gaming and tourism industries, are above all that, nestled in the higher elevations of the valley's surrounding mountains, where Richardson compares the weather—and the lifestyle—favorably to San Diego. When Lyon arrived here, he felt a sense of pride for helping. He saw "this beautiful building with this top-notch data center," he recalls. "And I met all the people who work there, and I kept thinking, I protected all of this. Me and my keyboard helped all these people keep their jobs. It was so neat to see how good a thing it was that we did." Richardson and Lyon bonded immediately. There was a party with professional-grade fireworks launched from Richardson's front lawn. They went to dinner, talked about life and the attacks. Lyon had developed antipathy to the extortionists; he wanted to nail them. He told Richardson and Lebumfacil he was going to start a business, a service whereby people could subscribe to his anti-DDoS attack infrastructure. Lyon recruited Lebumfacil to help him start DigiDefense. BetCris was his first customer. Richardson gave them office space to start.



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