Lottery Fraud nay Theft

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Sometimes you have to have access to a computer and the internet in order to check - the 100 Millionaire Raffle winning numbers from July

27th, for example. The numbers weren't announced on the draw programme, nor, as far as I'm aware, were they printed in any newspaper.

The claim rate by Millionaire Raffle winners seems to be somewhat below that for comparable prizes of £1 million and above won on the lottery itself. Last night they said that 11 of the 100 July 27th winners had yet to come forward.

Adrian

My impression is that the terminals are always online and that the barcodes don't actually directly code the number selections.

I meant for someone wanting to check their numbers without relying on the honesty of shop assistants.

I don't have definitive knowledge, and I'd welcome corrections from those in the know, but my understanding is that lottery terminals buffer up their transactions then send them to Camelot at frequent, regular intervals. There seems to be an arbitrary 7.30pm cutoff, after which you can't buy any lottery tickets, not even for draws later in the week, and I suspect that Camelot use that time to download updates to the terminals. There doesn't seem to be a similar curfew for on-line purchases.

Reports of various failed attempts at fraud suggest that the barcodes do encrypt the chosen numbers, together with the date and time and location of the purchase.

Camelot know where and when in the Stevenage/Hitchin area the ticket was sold corresponding to the unclaimed £63 million Euromillions prize, but even though the 30 day limit for claiming for a lost ticket has elapsed, it's their policy not to identify the specific retailer until the last moment before the time limit for claims expires.

Adrian

ISTM that all any retailer who intends to commit such fraud would need to do is have a losing ticket available out of sight, and feed that into the machine while the customer is present. He can then check the customer's ticket visually, and to be safe present any winning tickets to different outlets to claim the prizes.

That is correct. IIUC, the barcodes on the tickets are a unique code for the ticket itself which is looked up online on the main lottery computer's database. It prevents anyone from printing out a fraudulent winning ticket because nobody will be able to discover what number is associated with the winning ticket(s).

I'm not sure whether there is any meaningful data in the barcode - such as time, date and/or place of purchase etc.