[Legislurker]

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There will have to be mechanisms to track money as it flows and transfers around the online gaming economy.

We tend to obsess about the social injustice and hypocrisy of anti-online gaming arguments (addictive, destructive, immoral, exploitative of children). But perhaps the most effective argument that can be made to sway legislators to oppose online gaming centers around the "opportunities for terrorist financing." Remember, UIGEA was slipped into the Port Security Act for this very reason -- "we must protect our borders."

It's unlikely any legislation will pass that legalizes online gaming without including strict guidelines for monitoring money and the various ways it can be laundered.

Sites today have limited interest in self-regulation with respect to chip dumping (esp. HU). And who knows what kind of transfers NETeller was allowing.

It's these large sums of money flying around (going where?? to whom???) that scares the US gov't the most. All the rest of their shit is moral window dressing. Surely, some politicians actually believe the drivel rolling off their lips. The rest just drum up some reasons to support what their big campaign donors told them to think.

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Transactions to gaming sites are a blip on the radar, if that. Massive amounts of money fly from worldwide OFCs, AND most terrorist financing flows thru their own system of local bankers(Hawala). Bahrain, Qatar, Abu Dhabi, and Dubai are all huge financial centres. Bahrain has more traditional Islamic finacing. Im really at a loss how an effective worldwide terrorist network can use gaming AND ONLY gaming to transfer money. Western Union from a fake ID to a fake ID is a whole lot easier and cheaper. Terrorist financing is a buzzword to make idiots shut their mouths and say, oh its a good thing if it stops it. The only "terrorist" money the Feds can really stop are the bank accounts Iran and North Korea have with more established banks.