Thread: Gambling Domains Seized in America

People always seem to be frightened about the legal situation relating to domains in India. However, IMHO, the American government is much more to be feared than the Indian government.

Earlier this year, the US government seized some Cuba related domains WITHOUT any notice or due process, even though the owner operated out of Spain and only offered trips to Cuba for Europeans:

The travel agency in question—run by an Englishman named Steve Marshall who lives in Spain—specializes in trips to Cuba. Even though though the web site is not run by a U.S. citizen, is not based in the U.S., and is targeted at European travelers and not Americans, Marshall made one fatal mistake: he registered his domains in the United States.

That was enough for the U.S. government. In October, the U.S. Treasury Department ordered Marshall's domain registrar, eNom, to not only pull the plug on Marshall's domains, but to lock them down to prevent him from transferring them to a registrar outside of the United States.

from: Don't Register Your Domain in the U.S. if it's Controversial

Now the government of Kentucky has seized over 100 gambling domain names, again without notice. One of them belonged to Rick Schwartz. Most of the domains were just hosting parking pages:

The commonwealth of Kentucky issued a seizure order on September 18, ordering 141 domains be taken from their registrants.

“”The Domain names shall be immediately transferred by their respective registrars to an account of the Commonwealth of Kentucky “”.

The seizure was taken after the Commonwealth found that the “domains were being used in connection with illegal gambling activity”.

from: Kentucky Seizes 141 Gambling Domains

It's incredible to me that these things are done, in what is supposed to be a free country. Frankly, I think it's safer to hold domains outside of the US, including in India.

That's scary that the US government can just step in like that.

I don't quite understand... In the government's eyes, what's the difference between an offline and online casino? Why do they approve of offline casinos, but not online casinos?

Here's more about the seizure of the domains from the Kentucky Post:

Ky. Seizes Domain Names Of Web Gambling Sites - KYPost.com

This is what I found most interesting:

Unlicensed Internet gambling significantly undermines and threatens horseracing, Kentucky's signature industry and a key tourism industry, by creating unregulated and untaxed competition

In short, because the Kentucky government doesn't get a tax cut from these online casinos, they don't like online casinos.

For recent update, see new thread at: Judge issues order in Kentucky v. 141 Domain Names case