A few days ago, at a meeting in Frankfurt, Germany, it was discussed whether to ban online gambling in the EU. At the meeting were experts on internet gambling and the EU's president of Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act. The outcome of this meeting is something that pokerplayers in EU should be really worried about.
The EU's president of Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, Damian DeSutter from Holland and the Senator from the American Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (Eric Righter) presented all the negative things internet gambling has brought, such as gambling addiction, alcohol/drug related problems, money laundering, higher crime rates etc. Both DeSutter and Righter also mentioned that not ONLY bad things came with internet gambling.
"It is a billion dollar industry that keeps growing and creating jobs, even though the financial crisis we have right now all over the world, said Damian DeSutter".
He also wanted to make everyone aware that in the long run, internet gambling will cost countries and their governments&people more than it pays back in tax and jobs.
"It should be common sense that a ban of internet gambling in EU is the only right next step to take", said Senator Eric Righter. The majority of the members of the EU council were pleased with the information, and a stunning 70% of the EU member countries had voted for a ban of internet gambling across EU to be introduced within 12 months.
What does a ban of internet gambling within EU mean?
It means that it will be illegal and almost impossible to transfer money to a gambling site, if you are located in any of the member states. Also it will be illegal for gambling sites to accept customers from any EU country.
How will it work?
Only a little information has been disclosed at this time, but rumors say that it has been discussed to have Internet Service Providers block DNS-servers and IPs, so users cannot even access the gambling sites. This has already been seen before, like some countries have blocked access to the filesharing site ThePirateBay.