Multi-accounting and bonus abuse

Two problems in a real-money product. Closer to one in a product where an entry can be obtained without paying for it.

Definition

Multi-accounting is one person operating several accounts. Bonus abuse is working an offer for more than it was designed to give. In a paid product they are two problems with two owners: one is identity, the other is promotion design.

The distinction that matters

Here they are closer to one problem. A second account in a dual-currency product is worth something the moment it exists, because an entry can be obtained without paying for anything — so the duplicate account is not a route to abusing an offer, it is the abuse of the offer. Tightening the promotion and tightening identity are the same piece of work, and treating them as two projects is how one of them gets deferred.

Whose problem it is depends on the route, and mostly it is yours. The accounts, the signup flow and the entry route sit with the operator on both routes. Multi-accounting and bonus abuse are the operator's to control on both routes. On the managed platform our team sees activity and will tell you when something looks wrong; on an API integration we see none of it. Same shape as the monitoring answer already published, and it is a courtesy rather than a control.

The check that does exist by design sits at redemption, where identity has to be established before value leaves — who verifies and when covers what that check is and who performs it. It is a good place to catch a duplicate and a poor place to be catching it for the first time.

Where it comes up

At redemption, where an account that has never bought anything asks for value and the identity question arrives all at once. In offer design, where the honest test is what a determined person could do with ten accounts rather than what an average player will do with one. And in the reporting, where worked play and real play are indistinguishable until somebody looks.

Reviewed . Corrections are made visibly rather than silently.

A definition here is short on purpose. Where a term has a page behind it, the page is the better answer and the entry points at it.