U.S. House Clears Anti-Internet Gambling Bill

matr0x_x writes "The U.S. has just moved one step closer to banning all Internet gambling sites when the US House of Representatives cleared an anti-Internet gambling bill yesterday. The bill is against a World Trade Organization ruling last August that stated the US must not block online gambling sites based overseas." From the article: " The bill, cleared by voice vote in the House Financial Services Committee, would prohibit a gambling business from accepting credit cards, checks, wire transfers and electronic funds transfers in illegal gambling transactions. Unlawful gambling, under the legislation, would include placing bets on online poker sites, for example, and any other online wager made or received in a place where such a bet is illegal under federal or state law."

Comments

How it's written is what matters

[JehCt]

There's a big difference between blocking sites, and making it illegal for those sites to use the US financial system to collect illegal wagers from within US jurisdiction. So long as the bill is written correctly, there should be no problem with WTO, and no problem with enforcement.

Re:How it's written is what matters

[Anonymous Coward]

Fifty bucks says it's doesn't pass House debate

Re:How it's written is what matters

[Gorm the DBA]

For someone with more accounting/legal background...would anything keep me from opening, say a Bank of England account, funding that account via legal methods, using said account for various normal activities (ie debiting my groceries, etc) then when I want to fund a poker account using the funds from that account to do so?

I wouldn't be using the US financial system to fund the account, it would be my British (where this is legal, regulated, and presumably taxed) account, transferring money to a British online casino (pokerstars, for example). I would be using US wires to notify them to do this, but I'm not notifying them to do anything illegal (under their laws), so not running afoul of wire statutes...

Would this work? If so, I can see a huge business opportunity for overseas banking for the little guy, as opposed to the big corporation which uses a similar dodge to avoid taxes.

Re:How it's written is what matters

[HappyDrgn]

Fold...

Re:How it's written is what matters

[TheScottishGuy]

nothing really to stop you, except the difficulty involved in actually opening a british bank account, I had to spend almost 2 years in the uk recently and the hassle involved in opening an account is insane, and that's for someone with a UK passport who can walk into the branch. I was getting an apartment at the same time and the number of times i heard "well we can't hook up electricity until you have a bank account" or "we need a utility bill to open an account" was just nuts.

Re:How it's written is what matters

[joe545]

British banks generally require proof of residence (council tax or utility bills) to open a UK bank account so as to make life harder for money launderers, so this method won't be as easy as you think it is. Perhaps other countries (tax havens perhaps) have more lax banking laws which would make offshore gambling accounts feasable for the masses.

Also, members of the public are not normally eligible for an account with the Bank of England as it is more of a national financial institution (like the Federal Reserve in the USA) controlling national interest rates etc rather than a normal bank.

Re:How it's written is what matters

[cayenne8]

Geez....why write the thing at ALL???

When oh when will we be able to get people in govt. that will understand that if you're 18/21, you are a freaking ADULT, and can decide for yourself matters like these?

I am so fscking tired of the government trying to legislate morality and behavior.....

The way I see it

[matr0x_x]

When the US doesn't directly profit from the gambling (national lottery, Las Vegas economy, etc.) they try to get rid of it stating it is "immoral".

Re:The way I see it

[argoff]

IMHO, this bill has nothing to do with gambling. It has to do with controlling the flow of offshore funds and gambling is just a nice sounding excuse sorta like terrorisim and the war on drugs. The real fear of the government is that people will protect their rights because it is so easy to move money and funds offshore outside IRS controll. In the old days, the war on drugs was enough to hold most average people in check, but now with the information age they need to resort to more desperate measures.

Bill actually clears the House Financial Services

[j_rhoden]

Not the the bill actually cleared the House Financial Services Committee, not the House as the headline says. This means that it will go before the full House for debate.

Middle-Earth Bowl 2006

[Itninja]

The legislation carves out some exceptions, including wagering on horse races, governed under another U.S. law, and fantasy sports.

Gimme 10 G's on the Shire Hobbits in the 3rd [movie].

There's nothing in it for them--

[Tominva1045]

If the government could find a way to track it and then TAX it this would not be an issue.

This is already done with alcohol, tobacco, and tangible items.

Because they cannot capture the technology genie in a bottle they can't effectively tax it.

And there are plenty of lobbyists working for taxable gambling interests who have issue with the wild-west of internet gambling as well.

All forms of gambling?

[NiteShaed]

How does this affect the *really* big gambling sites, like NASDAQ and the NYSE?

Ohhhhhh, not *that* kind of gambling....silly me.

Re:All forms of gambling?

[EvanED]

Gambling is a game of luck

Tell that to the people who play in the big poker competitions. See what they have to say about that.

The funny bits

[Billosaur]

Major professional sports organizations supported the legislation, including the National Football League and Major League Baseball, saying in a joint statement that sports betting "threatens the integrity of our respective sports."

Buhwahahaha!! Can you say steroids?!? Can you say overblown contracts?!? There can't be a threat to something they don't have.

A group called the Poker Players Alliance opposed the legislation as well.

The Poker Players Alliance - a stalwart group of poker-playing heroes, determined to defend truth, justice, and the right to draw to an inside straight!

Let me get this straight

[hackstraw]

The bill, cleared by voice vote in the House Financial Services Committee, would prohibit a gambling business from accepting credit cards, checks, wire transfers and electronic funds transfers in illegal gambling transactions. Unlawful gambling, under the legislation, would include placing bets on online poker sites, for example, and any other online wager made or received in a place where such a bet is illegal under federal or state law.

So, today, its legal to do money transfers for illegal gambling?

So, today, in my state, the government is the only legal gambling outfit? (lottery)

So, its illegal for me to do business in another country according to their laws?

I don't gamble beyond retirement funds, insurance, and whatnot.

Here is interesting, and typical situations from those that "win" the lottery: http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/Savinganddebt/ Savemoney/P99649.asp

In the end, nothing will change. Offshore gambling will be no different.

Encouraging money laundering...

[tansey]

All this is going to do is encourage people to forgo using the direct deposit features most sites offer, opting for indirect funds deposits.

Right now, most sites offer the ability to write an e-check directly from a player's bank account to the poker site. However, virtually all sites also offer deposit via Neteller or Firepay. Since the latter method is not traceable since the 2 companies are not based in the US, players will just opt to use that method now.

So what this bill is effectively doing is encouraging people to launder how they cash in and out of poker sites. It will do nothing to stop people from actually playing.

RTFA

[kraada]

Doesn't the POSTER even RTFA these days? This bill cleared the committee. In fact, there's a line in the article which states:
"The bill now moves fo the House floor for consideration."

Not that it's impossible it will pass anyway, but please guys, get it right. It's not that hard.

From the summary...

[dtsazza]

The U.S. has just moved one step closer to banning all Internet gambling sites (my emphasis)

Really? This is another example of jurisdiction over the internet being called into question. My first though on reading the article was whether restrictions would apply to the casino, the gamblers or both. I'd imagine they'd almost certainly apply to the casinos - make it illegal for casinos based on servers in the US to accept electronic payment - but would it also be illegal for US citizens to place bets?

FTFA:

By making it illegal to accept payments from people who live where federal or state law prohibits wagering, the legislation would impact offshore gambling Web sites used by many Americans to place bets.

I don't see how this works. If a casino is outside the U.S's jurisdiction, they shouldn't be able to be held to any U.S. laws. Sure, you can outlaw this behaviour by making it illegal for a citizen to place a bet, or more likely by forbidding U.S. financial services (e.g. banks) from processing the request, but surely you can't affect those to whom U.S. laws don't apply?

Or perhaps I'm wrong, and you can - in which case, I'm worried about the precedent that would set. Is there a limit to the extent a country can create laws that affect those who are 'unaffected' by that country's laws? To a certain extent it's reasonable, but since this case involves two jurisdictions, with the casino outside the U.S.' jurisdiction and the gambler essentially going to the virtual casino to do business, it seems unreasonable. It's like the U.S. making it illegal for Mexican casinos to allow Americans to gamble there...