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 The Poker Players Alliance (PPA) announced that over $30 million of online poker money were frozen by the US Federal Government. The money belongs to more than 24,000 US players from Poker Stars and Full Tilt Poker. The reason behind this action as stated by the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York is the violation of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA).
The UIGEA is well known among online poker players since it forced most online poker rooms out of the US market in 2006. Since its introduction, the online poker market has changed a lot, with Poker Stars becoming market leader followed by Full Tilt Poker, and Party Poker losing its crown after retiring from the US market. Many poker networks decided to pull out of the US market, including iPoker (powered by Playtech) or Microgaming. However, some poker rooms decided to stay opened to US players.
According to the information released by the Poker Players Alliance, the frozen money is from withdrawal checks issued by Poker Stars and Full Tilt Poker to US residents. Players from other countries were not affected by this action. By now, there has been no official statement by Poker Stars regarding this issue. Their Press Office represented by Donna McLoughlin said they have nothing to comment about this at the moment. A Full Tilt Poker official announced that there is no need to worry about this for any of their players. He added that the funds from the bounced checks were added back to the players’ accounts, and that no player will end up using money after this incident. Other poker rooms operating in the US seemed not to be affected by this action, as representatives from Bodog and Cake Poker said their operations continued as usual and no problems were reported. This action has seriously affected the cashouts for US players from the two biggest poker rooms since checks and echecks were the only cashout method that worked for US players. We hope the problem will be resolved soon and US players will not face new problems in accessing and playing online poker for real money. |
