Hotel Arts Hosts EPT Barcelona Players Once Again

PokerStars has officially announced that this year’s EPT Barcelona event returns to host players at Hotel Arts, despite last year’s security scandal with pros’ laptops hacked.

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In 2013, players of EPT Barcelona experienced a security breach at the Arts Hotel as several pros’ laptops got hacked and Trojan viruses installed on them. Now, PokerStars confirms that the festival is returning to the familiar venue to celebrate the 100th event in the series [4], after security issues at the hotel had been solved and players’ personal and material safety ensured.

PokerStars Head of Corporate Communications Eric Hollreiser announced in a statement that “Players have used the Barcelona Arts Hotel for several years, and aside from this very narrow—though serious—issue, player surveys show that they are generally very happy with the hotel. Consequently, players will continue to be able to stay at the Barcelona Arts Hotel if they wish. Barcelona remains one of the most popular EPT tour stops and we aim to make sure it remains so.”

Last year, Jens ‘Jeans’ Kyllonen’s laptop got stolen from his hotel room [5] and scammers installed a Trojan software on it that would have enabled them to see his screen while playing. The high stakes PLO pro, however, discovered the scam before his computer could be returned and started warning fellow players not to play, once he discovered the machine was returned to him. Later, more players signalled that they suspected they had become victims, too.

At the time, PokerStars failed to effectively handle the situation but they assure players now that nothing similar has to be expected this year. Concerning the potential effect of a repeated scandal on the reputation of PokerStars, the EPT series and Hotel Arts, it is safe to assume they can indeed guarantee security.