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888.com surprises Aussies with its telephonic inducements to gamble
Gibraltar-based 888.com created a stir with the Australian newspaper The Age as the week ended with its fast telemarketing after a reporter visited the gambling website for subsidiary Pacific Poker.
Naming 888.com, The Age reported that online casinos, worth billions of dollars and based on the other side of the world, are telephoning Australian gamblers and offering them inducements to bet.
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The practice, believed to be illegal by the newspaper and the territory of Victoria Justice Department, was discovered this week after The Age logged on to several internet poker websites to research online poker.
Less than 24 hours later, one of the sites - Pacific Poker - telephoned, offering money to return and sign up. "We noticed you have tried to log on to our site and been unsuccessful," the company representative said. "If you would like to come back we can sort out any technical problems and also offer you a bonus."
The woman said the casino would offer an extra 35 percent on top of any amount deposited in a gambling account.
Internet casinos are forbidden by the Federal Interactive Gambling Act from advertising in Australia or from taking bets from Australians. But despite the laws, Australians continue to bet millions of dollars.
A spokeswoman for the Victorian Department of Justice said it was likely that the telephone approaches were illegal. "Victoria is of the view that the Commonwealth needs to take the lead in this matter," she said.
Problem gambling experts overstated the case by making the sound-byte comment:"We've always known that online gambling is dangerous - you can lose your home without even leaving home."
Pacific Poker is based in Gibraltar and owned by the 888.com - a multibillion-dollar online gambling entity. 888 was forced to cease all operations in the US in October last year after the US Government enacted tough new laws banning online gambling financial transfers. The Age claims.
Interestingly, a spokeswoman for Communications Minister Helen Coonan said while the government was concerned about problem gambling it had no plans to introduce laws banning the transfer of funds to online casinos "because it did not believe enough Australians were betting online to make such a measure necessary."
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