The Wire Act of 1961
Online Gambling is going through many changes right now. The US Department of Justice has made some changes to the Wire Act of 1961 recently. The decision was written out and passed last September, but just recently became public. This revision states the reversal of the prohibition of wagers made online crossing state lines and international borders on everything except sporting events and sports contests. Although the decision does not directly mention poker, this decision is meant to help the poker industry on down the road.
Professor Nelson Rose is a prominent online gambling expert and runs the blog “Gambling and the Law.”
According to an article from the cnn.com He states that: “The United States Department of Justice has given the online gaming community a big, big present,” He goes on to say that:
“If the Wire Act is limited to bets on sports events and races, what other federal anti-gambling statutes are left? There are prohibitions on interstate lotteries, but Powerball and the other multi-state lotteries show how easily these can be gotten around, even before Congress passed an express exemption for state lotteries. And poker is not a lottery under federal law.”
The Department of Justice is just doing their part after the Online Poker Indictment that occurred just over a year ago in April of 2011. Three of the largest poker sites were seized by the Government and many players lost millions of dollars. The Government is doing their best to prevent that unfortunate occurrence from happening again.
