March 10, 2010 (CAP Newswire) – The Northern European country of Norway recently passed a law very similar to the United States’ UIGEA (the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006), which doesn’t exactly outlaw Internet gambling, but instead makes it illegal for payment processors to approve online gambling transactions.
Called simply the “Payment Act”, Norway’s new law targets financial services providers that transfer or assist in the transfer of any payments from online gambling players or sites in Norway.
Is it a coincidence that the law comes into effect on the first of June, the same day that the UIGEA is to be fully implemented in the U.S.?
More to the point, given Sweden’s recent hard-line approach to online gambling, and the new trend of European governments restricting access to their online gambling markets, could this mean that European nations are becoming unfriendlier to online gambling?
Maybe, maybe not. In an article from eGaming Review, Stephen Ketteley, a gaming law expert, said: “Whilst this development, which has been a long time coming, will cause banks, processors and the like to re-assess any activities that could be caught by the ban, it will be interesting to see if it will have an appreciable effect on operators’ Norwegian businesses.
“Various other payments bans have struggled, either because operators have already established their view on taking related business – and a payments ban won’t change that – or because the financial services sector simply refuse to accommodate the authorities’ requirement to curb private gambling activity.” Click here to read the original article at eGaming Review.