Home » OCW News » June 2010 » Nevada Warns Casinos to Stay Clear of Online Gambling

Nevada Warns Casinos to Stay Clear of Online Gambling

Date published: 14 June 2010

This SlideShowPro photo gallery requires the Flash Player plugin and a web browser with JavaScript enabled.

It's funny how things work out sometimes. Take the giant casino groups in the United States. It wasn't too long ago that their lobbying dollars helped quash any chance of a legalised and regulated U.S. online gambling industry.

Most saw online gambling as a threat to their businesses, because it offers gamblers a safe, secure and cost-effective way to gamble from their own homes, as opposed to incurring the costs of travel, accommodation and food at land casinos.

However, after realizing how lucrative online gambling is and how low-cost online casinos are to operate compared with multi-billion dollar land casinos and resorts, many Vegas land casinos have begun to delve into the world of online gambling.

Harrah's Casino, for instance, has reportedly developed its own online gambling brand, and already owns an online casino that accepts from players outside the United States. As a result Nevada regulators have started investigating these 'tie-ups.'

And as a result, the Nevada Gaming Control Board (NGCB) has instructed the casino giants in Las Vegas to hold off on their online gambling interests until such time that online gambling has either been state or federally legalised and regulated.

Don't miss...

The irony has not been lost that the same online gambling ban that America's largest land gambling concerns played a part in facilitating via lobbying, is the same ban that is preventing them from hopping aboard the 'online gambling gravy train.'

The U.S. gambling ban came about in October 2006 when Congress voted in the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA), a piece of anti-online gambling legislation that was soon thereafter signed into law by the then President.

While the law, which came in to effect this month (June, 2010), does not prevent Americans from gambling online, it makes it illegal for U.S. banks, credit card firms and other financial institutions to process online gambling-related payments.