By Samantha Williams 

Online gambling sites are facing innumerable challenges from the law makers of certain countries to curtail their activities striking at the very root of them. The main contention of those who oppose to online gambling is that the sites are not following fair and ethical trade practices in accepting wagers in monies whether it is U.S. dollars or in Euros. 

The same argument goes for collection of revenues due to the tax collection authorities of these governments, unlike in the case of offline gambling casinos and clubs where the very physical presence of the outlets enables checking evasion of any tax liabilities.  This is countered by the supporters of online gambling sites, their associations and legal representatives that adequate checks and balances are already there, adopted by the websites to ensure fair-play in these matters and online gambling should be allowed to carry on business unobtrusively.

There is another dimension emerging on the legal wrangles between online gambling sites and authorities of law-making.  This is completely concerned with online betting on sports events. There are quite a large number of online gambling sites engaged purely on betting of monies on an array of sports like soccer, tennis, cricket, baseball and the like.  The monetary transactions on these betting on sports run into trillions of dollars and Euros annually.

For decades earlier in the western countries, betting on sports events has been going on even before the introduction of the Internet.  Like Inter-venue betting on horse racing, the gambling outfits were accepting wagers from the punters of their neighborhood on major sports events across the world, wherever they were held.  The size and measure of betting were enlarged to proportions of unimaginable magnitude when the cyber-world came into being.  Sitting at home any one had the facility of betting on the favorite side of any sports easily and all the wagering monies when pooled together offered an attractive dividend to each punter’s bet on winning.  This gradually grew into giving room for complaints from many quarters that pre-fixing the results of the events by manipulation of vested interests and unfair and unethical practices of gambling had started in the business.

In this background the latest complaint has come up against online betting of Grand Slam Tennis Tournaments such as French Open.  The organizers of French Open have opened up a landmark case in the Liege court of Eastern Belgium and Parris claiming that the online betting sites have stained the reputation of the championship tournament on the clay-court of Roland Garros.
The French Tennis Federation has claimed that the very integrity of the Tennis match is at stake because of such unethical practices being followed by the organizations of online betting.  They have cited many instances of foul-play in the trade, including a glaring example, which took place in August 2007 in one of the major tennis match held in Poland.  Their claim is backed by declarations of players that they were approached for fixing matches with hefty sums of money offered. The law suit is against three popular betting organizations, and praying for an injunction to stop making betting on French Open and fine of large amount for violation on a daily basis.  The sports lovers and players of online bets eagerly await the outcome of this landmark case which will have a very wide impact on the online betting industry.

If the European Commission holds its grounds strong, the German law prohibiting certain forms of online betting is about to go for a toss. But it’s still not clear who is going to win, though the new regulation posed by the German government attracted numerous criticisms from the German online gambling community. While the German government is looking at the whole game plan as a way to stop the money from going outside the country in vain, long-time online gamblers are criticizing massively the new regulations as much as the Internet betting companies as well as the lottery brokers. The ones that got the centre stage most due to the controversy are Bwin Interactive Entertainment, Tipp24 and Fluxx, who further turned up the heat by claiming the regulations as contrary to law and filing a lawsuit against the policies if required.
 
The European Gaming and Betting Association claimed Germany’s gambling law to be a violation of the European Union laws that approve of the free goods and services trading within the European continent. However, the only form of gambling that has not been threatened by it is horse racing, but that doesn’t seem to pull it off with the EGBA (European Gaming and Betting Association), more so, because of an arrest warrant issued against Unibet CEO Petter Nylander and his organisation. The European Commission backed much of the opposition indirectly; Germany was asked to reconsider the entire law by the Regulator of the European Union since they consider the agenda disproportional. However, Germany’s answer concerned the citizens of the country – it is a step the Government took to protect the Germans as well as the economy; that translated, to stop the German currency from crossing the borders and to lift the morals of the countrymen.

The European Commission’s regulatory arm has gone to the extent of opening an investigation regarding the German law; according to Oliver Drewes (commission spokesman) – “The government soon will decide whether Germany broke EU laws, for regulators are aware of the gambling groups’ concerns”. Now, with the commission and the European courts’ orders on the EU member countries for not – in any way – restricting legal gambling businesses, the law has taken a twist to controversies and European Government officials are gearing up to push ahead against the German as well as other EU states in the gambling sector with legal actions.
 
Sigrid Ligne (secretary general, EGBA) made his statement clear – “We urge the Commission now to fast track our complaint and launch infringement proceedings against Germany.” The actions have also been taken to stop financial losses from occurring to several related industries e.g. Aftonbladet, Sweden’s largest daily newspaper that generates revenues that is more than a million dollars every month from online gambling ads. The newspaper has asked Commissioner McCreevy to speed up the process against the gambling restrictions. However, if Brussels join the bandwagon of protestors against Germany, there are high chances that the European Court of Justice shall fine and force the country for changing its laws.