I doubt Bovada has “bots” playing and winning jackpots when they could literally just change or reset a progressive amount anyway if they really wanted to, if that’s a goal. However what’s the benefit there? They still have a huge edge even with these big 6-figure jackpot payouts.
What I do think is likely are jackpots won by players that are then invalidated and not paid due to the player violating some bonus term (betting over the max bet, multi-accounting, etc.). Those invalidated winnings should be added back to the progressives since a slot’s RTP is based on the progressive being fed on a percentage of each bet. Are they on Bovada? Not sure, but I doubt it.
Land-based casinos have to transfer progressives of machines they’re removing to other machines. On an unregulated, online casino where jackpot wins supposedly happen and can’t be witnessed by others, who knows what happens.
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