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As if the loss of NETeller was not enough bad news for US online casino
players. The FBI has frozen the funds of all customers in the United States
using a NETeller online casino e-wallet. At one time it was believed that
online casino guests would be refunded the money from their digital accounts.
Now all funds are being held by the FBI as evidence.
The latest oddity is that now, US authorities are trying to find a link
between NETeller’s online casino payment method and terrorism. The FBI is
developing an argument that e-wallet funds are being used to fund terrorist
activity. It is unlikely, as in the United Kingdom NETeller has public
shareholders, pays dividends, and makes available 100% audited financial
records.
Subpoenas have been issued, by the United States, to HSBC, Credit Suisse,
Dresdner Kleinwort, and Deutche Bank; a strange development, considering the
overtly transparent nature of the UK payment companies. These companies took
part in underwriting public offerings for a few of the more popular online
casinos. They all have London-based offices and their records are being
subpoenaed.
Digital currency operators are all anxiously waiting to discover who will be
next in this online casino witch hunt. A leading gambling expert described this
online casinos equal terrorism equation as “a smoke screen thrown up by
right-wing Christian lunatics in the government who want to control every facet
of human behavior from birth to death.” He continued, “As far as I know, there
isn’t a scintilla of evidence there’s any link between online casinos and
terrorist groups.”
The anti online casino journey is not exactly clear. It began with Virginia
Rep. Bob Goodlatte’s H.R. 4411 bill to ban online casinos and all forms of
internet gambling. The bill received full support of the Christian Coalitions.
That was yesterday. Today, US attorney David Litterick from the Southern
District of New York is drawing broad lines between online casinos and support
for Osama Bin Laden. Online casinos were once seen as a threat to
impressionable children; it is now demonized as a threat to the free world.
Litterick will prove a formidable adversary to the executives of NETeller.
Litterick prosecuted terrorists in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing as well
as the terrorist bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. He currently has an
influential office in the Department of Homeland Security.
The United States is on the verge of a dark age for electronic money
management. Legislators are taking a step forward against online casinos at the
price of three steps back in e-commerce.
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