Feds Investigate Second Life Casinos

[dgridley]

NEW YORK (Reuters) -- FBI investigators have visited Second Life's Internet casinos at the invitation of the virtual world's creator Linden Lab, but the U.S. government has not decided on the legality of virtual gambling.

"We have invited the FBI several times to take a look around in Second Life and raise any concerns they would like, and we know of at least one instance that federal agents did look around in a virtual casino," said Ginsu Yoon, until recently Linden Lab's general counsel and currently vice president for business affairs.

Second Life is a popular online virtual world with millions of registered users and its own economy and currency, known as the Linden dollar, which can be exchanged for U.S. dollars.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/internet/04/04/secondlife.gambling.reut/index.html

I personally see no problem with online gaming as long as it can be regulated in some way, but there's the rub: nearly impossible.

 

[Peter]

I personally see no problem with online gaming as long as it can be regulated in some way, but there's the rub: nearly impossible.

I don't think that regulation is all of the problem. There is no age restriction for people playing Second Life and the money used in the game can be converted into real cash so it is a real form of gambling. This being the case minors have an easier way to gamble. Also of course there is the matter of the US gambling laws that came in last year.

 

[RickM]

Hmm,

They (if they wanted to) could actually get around the law by locating their servers in another country that allows gambling. However it would likely reduce performance for US users.

I have to agree, there is no problem with it but the problem is, minors can very easily partake in gambling via second life.