Without Online Gambling Regulation, Children Left Unprotected
Reports are in of child participation in online gambling at several countries around the world. Not coincidentally, countries suffering the greatest number of incidents of adolescent Internet gambling are the same countries which choose to outlaw online casinos rather than regulate them.According to a report by the Vancvouver Sun, thirty percent of underage people in Canada have lied about their age online, and one in three male children have turned to Internet gambling as a pastime when not monitored by parents. The number is higher than the number of those seeking pornography or nudity online.
A Shanghai paper reported this week that over a hundred first-and second-graders were expelled for gambling on basketball at just one school. Despite China's efforts to portray online gambling as among the most heinous evils, the practice of wagering has spread to the earliest ages.
The Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania has estimated the number of teenagers playing at online casinos to be close to one million a month. Moves by the US government to ban Internet casinos have been worse than ineffective, driving reputable, socially responsible operators from the US market while remaining unable to block access to shady operations.
The common denominator, says Online Casino Advisory senior gaming analyst Sherman Bradley, is lack of regulation. "In England, it was discovered that some casinos were not diligent about age verification. Those casinos were advised to quickly rectify the situation or face loss of licensing.
No such threat exists in the US, China, or Canada. Because these countries are determined to try to block the Internet rather than use regulatory powers to enforce child protections, there is no recourse when age verification is not adequately enforced."
Bradley pointed out that attempting to block the flow of information, particularly on the Internet, is like trying to dam a river with one's hands. He stated that only encouraging the creation of a "white market' through licensing and regulation could a society rid itself of black market problems.
