Casino Affiliate Programs owner Lou Fabiano selling confidential player details
Sunday, March 04, 2007
Casino Affiliate Programs owner Lou Fabiano selling confidential player details
Update 31st August 2010:
Lou Fabiano, aka "The Professor", died as a result of complications from a congestive heart disorder last week, on 24th August 2010 at the age of just 47. I considered removing these articles, but since they are a historically factual record of an incident the reading of which will hopefully discourage others from repeating, I'm going to keep them intact. This does not reflect any abiding ill will that I, or anyone else, feel towards Lou, to whom I can only say I wish the best in whatever realm he may have moved to.
Best wishes, Lou.
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This occured two years ago now, but the nature of this behaviour on the part of an influential industry member makes it very relevant today.
On March 3rd 2005, a post from Lou Fabiano, owner of Casino Affiliate Programs, essentially a trade association of online casino affiliates, appeared on the forum offering up for sale a database of 100,000 players, provided by a casino:
This post subsequently disappeared, and its existence was denied, after much outrage was expressed that the owner of a prominent website in the affiliate community should resort to selling confidential player details.
The private information that a player provides to set up an account with an online casino is just that: private. Casinos should absolutely never pass this information on to their affiliate business partners (and certainly no respectable casino would do this), and no responsible affiliate should ever then take such a confidential list and offer it up for sale on a prominent web site.
That such an enormous list was offered for sale on just such an influential web site is an act of betrayal of the player by the affiliate community. It is essentially saying "If you click on the links on my site, and sign up an account with the casino in question, I reserve the right to sell your confidential inforamtion on to third parties, without your permission.".
This is an extremely unfortunate stance to be taken by a prominent casino affiliate, as it sends out a message to the player community that their confidential information, far from being confidentially held, is regarded as public property.
In such fraught times for the online gambling industry since the passage of the Internet Gambling Prohibition and Enforcement Act, this is not exactly the best message to be sending to players, the community at large and the United States administration.
(See follow up article.)
10 Previous Comments
Aside Sucks via Mr Racetrack, this is the only site to my knowledge who dared mention Lou Fabiano selling UK players out.
Maybe your details were sold for 2 bob too.
A casino database will have what?... Name, address, DOB, credit card details, bet type etc.. Who knows?
By 
, at
10:09 am
The industry shouldn't allow people to get by with this sort of non-sense; not yesterday, not tomorrow, NOT EVER!
It is unbelievable and quite disgusting how people just turn their heads in the other direction and all but ignore the BS.
As I recall this particular issue was discussed over on the forum igami, I seen there is also a new post up about the recent dispute as well. Of course I guess ethics are the last thing on most affiliates minds; very sickening indeed!
By 
truthstudent, at
1:39 am
Ethics and online gambling aren't exactly synonymous concepts.
It would certainly be interesting to know the extent of the details Fabiano was selling off - just names, or addresses and credit card details etc? I imagine this is why he denied it, as there would potentially be legal issues involved if he was offering up actual private financial information - which he most likely was.
Someone should ask him.
By 100% Gambler, at
2:42 am
There is another site who mentions this issue - and others, although much of it is in a private section. This particular site is not allowed to be mentioned at CAP. Instead of supporting this group, CAP shuns and disses it. Afraid it's competition?
CAP and it's owners are allowed to get away with just about anything their hearts desire. Reason? Very few people have the guts to stand up and say anything, and when they do they are either banned or edited - here's a group of ethical webmasters who have been talking about this very subject:
http://www.igami.org/Forum/viewtopic.php?t=810&highlight=
I will keep my identity secret because I have been put through the ringer and dragged through the mud for speaking up one time too many.
By , at
8:22 pm
What a shame if true. The potential damage to players confidentially rights is destoyed. The aftershocks quite disturbing. I can certainly see where some identity theft can come into play here.
By , at
5:13 am
It's certainly true - screenshots don't lie.
I can't make up my mind whether this was originally done through ignorance or malice. It's been suggested that it might have been a "mistake". That's possible, but there have been other instances of database sales which have also gone unchallenged, which suggests a mindset which considers this kind of thing acceptable.
If Fabiano had acknowledged and apologised for the incident one would have had to sign it off as the ignorance of two years' less experience. His denial that the incident actually even occured doesn't lend itself to such a conclusion, however.
By 100% Gambler, at
9:14 pm
Interesting story I didn´t know about this before.
By , at
3:04 pm
It's to no surprise that Casino Affiliate Programs (CAP) practices all kinds of unethical ways such as selling player lists. You have to remember that CAP is run by bullies that do not only harass members but advertisers also. They intimidate and use the power of their affiliate forum to run down anyone that dares to criticize them. Forum members can get banned very easily and advertisers can face vicious attacks. CAP sucks and soon enough more and more people will see this and advertisers will start to drop out... bye bye CAP you won't be missed.
By , at
10:21 pm
This blog article got me thinking about this matter again:
Midas Oracle violation of privacy or data proptection regulations
By 100% Gambler, at
10:39 pm
Louis Fabiano, aka "The Professor", died three weeks ago as a result of complications from a congestive heart disorder, on 24th August 2010 at the age of just 47. I considered removing these articles, but since they are a historically factual record I'm going to keep them intact. This does not reflect any abiding ill will that I, or anyone else, feel towards Lou, to whom I can only say I wish the best in whatever realm he may have moved to.
Best wishes, Lou.
By 100% Gambler, at
3:32 pm