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UK National Lottery website down before drawingNews Story
Frustrated players unable to buy tickets for the 5 million draw By Kate Northrop A power outage in Watford, a small town 15 miles northwest of London, caused the UK National Lottery website and smartphone app to crash and continue to remain out of action just four hours before the big drawing of 5 million (US$6.2 million) on Wednesday. The Camelot Group, the operator of the UK National Lottery, houses its headquarters in Watford. Although the power outage was reported at 6:57 am and
May 7, 2020, 1:46 pm - Lottery News

Man exploits Arizona Lottery vending machine flaw, gets $55K worth of free ticketsNews Story
A man is accused of exploiting a flaw in the Arizona Lottery vending machines to get over $55,000 worth of lottery tickets. Earlier this week, the Arizona Attorney general's Office filed charges against Everado Najera-Nava, 40, for computer tampering and fraud. Investigators say that Nava exploited a flaw in Arizona Lottery vending machines that gave him $54,699 worth of lottery tickets without paying for them. Police say Nava would enter his debit card into the machine to start the transa
Mar 15, 2020, 11:09 am - Lottery News

Some Oregon lottery tickets printed with wrong dateNews Story
By Todd Northrop Oregon residents who purchased Powerball lottery tickets over the weekend will want to double check the draw dates after a computer glitch caused some tickets to misstate which date the winning numbers will be drawn, lottery officials said Tuesday. Advance 24-draw quick-pick Powerball tickets printed between Friday, Aug. 10 and Monday, Aug. 12 listed incorrect dates for the Oct. 26, 29 and Nov. 2 draws, the lottery said in a statement. While the dates on the tickets are o
Aug 15, 2019, 8:30 am - Lottery News

Illinois Lottery glitch causes trouble for retailers, including overpayment to winnersNews Story
The Illinois Lottery's transition to a new central gaming system has caused trouble for some retailers, including overpayments to winners. The ticket validation issue was discovered Feb. 20 and resolved the same day, said Illinois Lottery spokesman Jason Schaumburg, who didn't know how much extra money was awarded. Stores that paid out incorrect winnings can be reimbursed if they submit a written account of the error to the central lottery office in Springfield, said Bill Fleischli, the ex
Mar 4, 2019, 3:20 pm - Lottery News

NM Lottery Pick 4 computerized drawing glitch made many tickets worthlessNews Story
Players can get a refund IF they held onto losing tickets By Todd Northrop When the New Mexico Lottery introduced its latest lottery draw game, Pick 4, in early February, players had no idea that many of the tickets they purchased were completely worthless with no chance of winning. That's because the game's computerized drawings were incorrectly programmed, making combinations with repeat digits impossible to be drawn. Only combinations in which every digit was different were able to b
Feb 21, 2019, 7:25 pm - Lottery News

Illinois Lottery fixes problem that prevented some ticket salesNews Story
Pick 3 and Pick 4 games were affected Several lottery players in Illinois were unable to purchase Pick 3 and Pick 4 tickets from retailers Tuesday, just before the midday drawing. Around 5:50 p.m. Tuesday, Lottery officials said that the technical issue they experienced with Pick 3 and Pick 4 has been resolved. Players can resume purchasing tickets for these games at Illinois Lottery retailers, according to a tweet. We apologize for the inconvenience. Tonight's 9:22 p.m. draw will take
Jan 16, 2019, 11:11 am - Lottery News

Oregon Lottery glitch in July made all Keno tickets losersNews Story
The Oregon Lottery has built up a $1.2 billion a year business trafficking in the eternal thrill of gambling. Just one of its games, Keno, was played an extraordinary 73.7 million times last year. But the Keno odds took a sudden swing in the early morning hours of July 23, when scanners read all Keno tickets as losers, even when they weren't. The Lottery never widely disclosed the technical glitch that gave players zero chance of winning. The agency confirmed the defect lasted nearly six h
Sep 10, 2018, 5:53 am - Lottery News

MUSL issues report about computerized drawing failures in ArizonaNews Story
One machine was broken, the other generated 'apparently valid results' By Todd Northrop The Arizona Lottery released the report last month from the Multi-State Lottery Association's (MUSL) investigation of a computerized drawing malfunction that caused the same winning numbers to be generated in successive drawings. When lottery drawings are discussed or envisioned by members of the public, one imagines a spinning drum of numbered balls from which the lucky winning numbers are drawn. I
Apr 11, 2018, 9:45 am - Lottery News

S.C. lottery glitch could result in $35 million in prize payouts; NJ firm will investigateNews Story
South Carolina lottery officials say a computer glitch that made winners out of everyone who played a holiday game for two hours on Christmas Day could result in a more than $35 million prize payout nearly double the initial estimate. The S.C. Education Lottery Commission announced the new figure Tuesday at a special meeting called to discuss the ongoing fallout from a programming error. The mistake had players of the Holiday Cash Add-A-Play game seeing three matching Christmas trees print
Jan 23, 2018, 6:00 pm - Lottery News

Michigan Lottery's gamble on new website doesn't pay off on first tryNews Story
The Michigan Lottery launched a refreshed website Wednesday morning, but it didn't go as planned. Users of the new MichiganLottery.com experienced slowdowns after the change-over from the old site, lottery spokesman Jeff Holyfield said. We were getting calls, emails... from players saying the website wasn't responding well, he said. The project team took down the site for a couple minutes and tried to fix the issue, but it didn't immediately work. It then reverted to the old site so pl
Jan 18, 2018, 10:17 am - Lottery News