Heh, what?

In an action that roiled the fast-growing world of online gambling, a top executive of a British Internet company was arrested on U.S. soil late Wednesday on charges connected with taking wagers from bettors in the United States.

...

While it is not illegal under U.S. law for Americans to make online bets, federal prosecutors maintain that it is illegal for online operators to solicit or accept them, even when their operations are located offshore.

Is it just me, or is that completely stupid?

haha
extremely stupid

But thats normal american behavior.

Pretty funny actually as it (US Law) doesn't actually cover Online Casinos, only betting that includes wagering on events etc which they are capable of dragging up some trumped up charges based on a law passed in the 60's about using a phoneline to place your bets

You do all realise tho it is 100% illegal for Aussies to play at an online casino *period* yet we (the company I have work for) can legally accept wagers from overseas punters :/ an provide them with a perfectly safe environment in which to gamble. Why we don't extend that to Australians is what's REALLY f***ing stupid as we're fully and completely licensed and regulated (read Controlled to an almost Nazi like degree) by the Aussie Govt.

NB: The "nazi like" comment is my own personal opinion an not that of the company I work for.

Hermitech, i don't think it is. Games of chance online are illegal here too.

Link to Summary of Interactive Gambling Act
Link to Review of the operation of the Interactive Gambling Act 2001

The IGA targets the providers of interactive gambling services, not their potential or actual customers. The IGA makes it an offence to provide an interactive gambling service to a customer physically present in Australia.
# This offence applies to all interactive gambling service providers, whether based in Australia or offshore, whether Australian or foreign owned.
# This offence carries a maximum penalty of $220,000 per day for individuals and $1.1 million per day for bodies corporate.
# This offence comes into effect on the 28th day after Royal Assent.

There you go, you can't provide online gambling services to australians, so while it may be 'normal american behavior' to arrest those that run gambling joints when they visit, the IGA could be used here to do the same.

There you go, you can't provide online gambling services to australians

Yup, that's what I said champ

You do all realise tho it is 100% illegal for Aussies to play at an online casino

We don't and never have since the moratorium was passed

While it is not illegal under U.S. law for Americans to make online bets, federal prosecutors maintain that it is illegal for online operators to solicit or accept them, even when their operations are located offshore.

That's like saying it's gay to take it up the ass but it's not gay to give it.

haha hermi your casino is dodge as. i don't know why anyone would want to place a wager there. :)

And you would know this how?
Unless you've actually worked here and seen the level of development that goes on behind the scenes unlike the office clerks at neweCON that only handle the administration for someone elses casino.

unlike the office clerks at neweCON

lawls

hey we own all the casinos we run now :P

Perhaps if we ignore it (USA) it will go away...

roil (roil)
v. roiled, roil·ing, roils
v.tr.
1. To make (a liquid) muddy or cloudy by stirring up sediment.
2. To displease or disturb; vex: My roommate's off-putting habits began to roil me.
v.intr.
To be in a state of turbulence or agitation.


Wow, I learned a new word.

Have you ever heard the term "all riled up over something"?

Well, roiled is its origin I believe

rile (rl)
tr.v. riled, ril·ing, riles
1. To stir to anger. See Synonyms at annoy.
2. To stir up (liquid); roil.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Variant of roil.]


Well there you go!
I never knew "riled" could be interchanged with "roiled"
I spose they sound kinda similar, esp. with a North English type accent.
Go on, say it out loud. It's fun. And educational.

You do all realise tho it is 100% illegal for Aussies to play at an online casino *period*

Herm, i SO mis-read you. I'm reading clearly now and see my original post was pointless.

Sok nats =)
You know I wubs ewe

He is not the first either trog! They have already moved 2 conferences that where taking place over there in sept oct. They are even trying to introduce changes to their wire act which will make it the banks responsibility over there to make sure none of its clients gamble online (other than the state sanctioned lotteries). At the moment the banks are lobbying hard to make sure this doesn't happen as its technicaly impossible.

The funny thing is one of the main senator's promoting the changes to the wire act and the introduction of the online gambling bill is saying that this isn't a prohibition of online gambling, we all know prohibition doesn't work. :)

A similar thing was attempted here by our government. They wanted the credit card companies to introduce a seperate purchase-type code for gambling and then force australian banks to not honor payments for that type code. The credit card companies said it was too hard to introduce a seperate code for gambling so it continues to appear in the entertainment category. I think the US government may have more pull though :-)

payment gateways operating outside of the country make that credit card stuff useless. plus payment gateways are already popular

Why are you surprised?

They voted back in a President who can't even speak properly.

Are there any gambling sites that accept paypal? If there are, trying to police online gambling in any way, shape or form is a moot point.

Why are you surprised?

They voted back in a President who can't even speak properly.

So did we!

Are there any gambling sites that accept paypal? If there are, trying to police online gambling in any way, shape or form is a moot point.

We used to accept PayPal then we dropped it so as not to get involved some class action suit that was taking place against them way back when. We currently use FirePay, InstaCash, Moneybookers, NeTeller, PrepaidATM, Citadel, Click2Pay, InstaDebit so there are a few different methods of topping an account up

How can a bank me made responsible for a transaction that comes through a payment gateway, unless the payment has a specific transaction type that can be identified and thus rejected. Also how can the payment be regulated it the payment is made outside of the contries duristriction, I would contest that it isn't the banks fault that a person governed by the laws of that state accessed an illegal site to do something illegal. Who should be held accountable the ISP, not a problem just so long as their is a regulator publishing a list of websites deemed illegal to participate with so the ISP's could block them, but that would be about as capable as trying to block all the wholes in a vegetable strainer with only your 10 fingers, completely usless!

The only reason they want to impose such laws is to cater for the Casino's, hey Joe Public is only allowed to give their money to US and not those nasty online tricksters!

Can't wait for the Today Tonight episode about the single mother of 3 going bankrupt because she maxed out her credit cards using online gambling and now its the banks fault because their responsible for her failings as a human being!

"We currently use FirePay, InstaCash, Moneybookers, NeTeller, PrepaidATM, Citadel, Click2Pay, InstaDebit"

A thing to remember is most of these payment gateways are US based. Even if they aren't, they are still operating under constraints. For example, if you depost money in your Moneybookers account using a Mastercard, you can't use that money to gamble. Works fine if you use Visa. Go figure.

Most of the CC gateways have offices in most 1st world countries, I can also name of the top of my head several payment gateways (not just internet gateways but ATM and EFTPOS) that re run by 3rd parties. The remifications are far more reaching then just Web Payment Gateways, Australian has one of the best inter-financial gateway systems in the world bar none! Go to America and try to use a non affiliated ATM and see what happens, even if it is Visa or Mastercard approved!

As for EFTPOS, forget it thats even a bigger nightmare!

Americian Financial institutions come over here to see how it is done, not the otherway around. Go back 10 years and the world was playing catch up to Australia and NZ.

So to put into prospective for those not working in the Industry, Australia has 3RD Party Gateways as well a Bank Gayeways, all these gateways use each other to provide you the consumer with what appears to be a fairly seemless availability, a single transaction could pass through as many as 3 seperate gateways before being processed via your financial institution.

Also Banking is done very differently in the US, they have less mononlithic banking and more community based (Credit Union), last figures I remember (through the burbon haze) was well over 50% outside of major (as in LA, NY etc) bank with community based banks. Linking all these small enities is big business .

Compared with Australia where we have 144approx Credit Unions and less than 100 Building Societies, not sure about Friendly Societies. When I was in the States 10years ago, there where more Community Based banks in Floridia olone than the whole of Australia, and cheques was still the major payment method.

BPay, is huge, especially as a concept that hasn't been implemented into the US yet!

Anyway enough ranting, won't happen, be just like RIAA going after file sharing 99.9% of the people will remain unaffected!

neteller is based in the isle of man so should be free of american interference. though, last time i rang them i dealt with someone that sounded american.. looking at their website they might of been canadian.