Americas Cardroom players will no longer need to ask for ScreenShield. From November 4, Winning Poker Network will switch the table-protection feature on by default for players across the network.
ScreenShield is designed to stop protected WPN poker-table content from appearing through the screen-capture and screen-sharing methods it covers. Players still see their own tables normally, and the game itself does not change.
The new default also leaves room for how poker is actually played and shared. Players who stream, record sessions, make training content or work with coaches can open the ScreenShield page in Settings and turn the feature off themselves when they need capture functionality.
WPN is also looking at whether an even broader rule is warranted. The network is evaluating a policy that could prohibit third-party software from being used alongside the poker client. No final decision has been made, and the review is focused on balancing additional security and Game Integrity protection against legitimate player use cases.
The move follows a large-scale gameplay review tied to the recent remote-access software concerns. WPN examined more than 2,000,000 hands from players whose devices had MeshAgent detected and says it found no evidence that any reviewed player was using hole-card knowledge on the network.
Roughly 200,000 of those hands were played by Paul Gregg, who had become a focal point of discussion within the high-stakes community. WPN says its review found no evidence that Gregg could see opponents’ hole cards or used hole-card knowledge while playing on WPN.
The network separately closed Gregg’s account after weighing broader information gathered during its investigation and through communication with other operators. WPN says that account decision was separate from its gameplay findings.
ScreenShield is also being treated as an industry-security issue rather than only a network feature. WPN has shared information with other online poker operators about how this type of protection can be implemented so they can evaluate whether similar safeguards could help their own players.
Industry context
ScreenShield was first applied on a request basis. In an ACR Poker statement of 6 October, the operator said WPN contacted players on 29 September whose devices met its detection criteria for software with remote-access or screen-control capabilities, and activated ScreenShield as a precaution. Players could ask WPN support to enable it, and an individual on/off control in the poker client was still in development.
The same statement said WPN’s review found no compromise of its systems, poker software or official downloads, and that detecting remote-access software does not alone prove a device was compromised or that cheating occurred. A separate Game Integrity investigation was ongoing.
The concerns surfaced publicly on 29 September, when a poster using the handle WolfSec0x0 said on X that a remote-access agent had been planted on about 30 players’ Windows PCs, Card Player reported on 4 October. The outlet described the accusations against Gregg as unproven.
Source: Winning Poker Network
