Carrying a device for counting cards is an offense in many casinos in the USA. However, you can probably do so, if you are using a iPhone or an iPod touch.

Although, no one knows for certain what mechanism it exactly is, there is a rogue program (an app) in the open which can be used on Apple’s darling devices and can make counting real easy, that is, making it a pretty potent device for beating the mounting odds at Blackjack tables.

As reported in The Straits Times, Nevada gaming control board member Randall Sayre wrote in a Feb 5 letter to casino operators:

Once this program is installed on the phone through the iTunes website it can make counting cards easy.

What’s more to this software is that it disguises its counting abilities by using a “stealth mode” that shuts off the phone screen. A cake-walk for a  an adept user to dupe the on-lookers as using the app is simple enough - the user  just needs to tap a virtual button on screen each time for a card of 10 or higher value is tuned up. Similarly, they just need to tap a different button for lower value screens.

The same report in The Straits Times elaborates how it works:

A mini-software program continually updates a ‘true count,’ which with one peek can provide feedback regarding a player’s chances of winning by getting cards with total values that are closest to 21 points without exceeding that amount.

So far this malpractice has been spotted in some Northern Californian casinos. The California gaming regulators in turn tipped the Nevada casinos.

Now what if you are caught using this program? As quoted in the Casino Gambling Web, a manager at one of Las Vegas’ casinos says:

If a player uses the program and is caught inside doing so inside of our casino, we will take the same steps that we follow in any other situation where cheating is involved.

Now that might become a bit too hot to handle, especially as cheating at card games is counted a felony offence in Nevada.