I told my poker playing buddies about Poker Strategy and some of them thought it was pretty sweet that you could sign-up and get 50$ to play for free.
However, the first of my friends that did just told me that Poker Strategy asked him to send them his drivers licence info as part of a "random security check". He told me that stank of identity theft and wouldn't submit the info. Indeed, I can see why gambling sites such as Party Poker, FullTilt, Titan Poker etc, would want to certify the identity of their users but I think that Poker Strategy itself asking for that kind of information is pretty sketchy. Why does Poker Strategy requests that kind of info? Isn't there any other type of less intrusive measures that could be taken in order to verify identity if that is really needed?
Anyway, the end result now is that the 50$ bonus that looked "too good to be true" coupled with that information request has convinced my friend to never use the site again. Of course, he told my other buddies and they're are now wary of the site.
My opinion is that indeed smart people should pay attention to what kind of information they share with websites and although I personnally have a good experience with Poker Strategy so far (in part because such info was not requested when I signed up), I cannot find good arguments to convince my friend of surrendering the personnal information. I would never share on the web information like my driver licence # or SIN. I would share only my credit card # with well known websites that actually have a requirement for it (such as gambling sites or when purchasing something).
Poker Strategy is none of that and I don't see why they should get anything more than basic info.
