Minnesota Wants to Block Gambling Domain Names
Wednesday, April 29th, 2009
State tries to cut off gambling sites from the communication providers instead of domain names.
The state of Minnesota as informed 11 internet service providers that they must block access to about 200 gambling web sites. Sound familiar? Kentucky also tried to block online gambling but by seizing domain names that belonged to the gambling sites instead of cutting off ISPs.
Much like the case in Kentucky, Minnesota seems to be financially motivated. The Minneapolis Star Tribune quotes John Willems, director of the state’s Alcohol and Gambling Enforcement Division:
He did say he has anecdotal evidence that Internet gambling “is fairly large” in Minnesota, noting that Canterbury Park in Shakopee has said that its casino-style games have been hurt.
While it’s good that Minnesota isn’t going after domain owners’ rights directly, the state will soon hear a backlash from groups like Electronic Frontier Foundation that worry about where you draw the line.
Further Reading:
Domain Name Wire: Minnesota Wants to Block Gambling Domain Names – http://xr.com/vu3
at least they havn’t resorted to stealing other people’s property. If gambling is illegal in Minnesota, perhaps this is the best approach to the problem.
I’ve never understood the US policies about online gambling…there are many ways to gamble if you want to…its been proven Internet gambling is something people want…its easy to implement yet governments would rather fight it than to make $$$ on something people will ne doing anyway
I find much of American policy doesn’t make sense. It’s all puritan throwback stuff. So gambling is bad, and nudity on tv is bad but then you take a look around at what is ok and it makes no sense.
[...] this year Minnesota tried to force ISPs to block access to gambling web sites. The move came on the heels of a similar action from [...]