---
title: "Hacker steals $12 million in Zynga Poker chips | Online Poker Bonus"
url: https://mpcpoker.com/hacker-steals-zynga-poker-chips/
description: "A computer hacker from Devonshire, England faces possible jail time as he pledged guilty to stealing $12 million in Zynga Poker chips from the Facebook game developer.."
published: 2011-02-07
updated: 2011-02-07
---

# Hacker steals $12 million in Zynga Poker chips | Online Poker Bonus

Published 2011-02-07

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[News](https://mpcpoker.com/category/news/)·February 7, 2011

A computer hacker from Devonshire, England faces possible jail time as he pledged guilty to stealing $12 million in Zynga Poker chips from the Facebook game developer.

The 29-year old Ashley Mitchell stole 400 billion virtual poker chips from the popular Facebook app and tried to sell those chips on the black market. He netted a nice $85,000 before he got arrested and he would have made almost $300,000 if he would have sold all his chips with the prices he was asking. The value of the chips if Zynga would have sold them was a staggering $12 million.

The case of the stolen chips got a lot of interest from experts, as many are curious how a judge will respond to the theft of virtual goods. Jas Purewal, an expert in social gaming law:*“This case is particularly interesting because it involved a UK court recognising virtual currency – in this case, Zynga chips – as legal property which can be protected by existing UK criminal laws.”*

He continues: *“The court effectively found that, even though virtual currency isn’t real and is infinite in supply, it still can deserve legal protection in the same way as real world currency”.*

The hackers are warned..

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