We get this question a lot here at Sportsbooks.net. Players who or want to bet online would like to know if it’s legal or illegal to gamble on the internet. The short answer is NO, it’s not illegal to gamble online as a player. Also, the government will not make it illegal for a player to gamble online anytime soon. The federal government has never been interested in players. There was one attempt that was made by republican Senator John Kyl from Arizona who is the second most powerful man in the US Senate. He came out with what was called the Kyl bill which would have made it a federal crime to gamble online.
The department of justice quickly came out and said they were not interested in knocking on doors and arresting $10 bettors making the bill dead. There is no federal law and we don’t believe there will ever be a federal law that will make it illegal to gamble online or even make a bet with an illegal bookie in another state. However, there are ancient laws in about half the states that make it a crime to make a bet. California has a law that states you can not record, accept or even make a bet on a sporting event but no one has ever been arrested for making a bet on that statue. On Superbowl Sundays, the governor of these states usually make bets with governors of other states.
So they have states that have laws about gambling that are not enforced but there is no federal law against it. The more serious problem gambling online is if the company goes out of business, there is no legal recourse in getting the money back. Under the law of the English speaking world, gambling debts are unenforceable unless you have a special statue or court ruling that makes it otherwise, the courts are supposed to leave the parties where they find them.
So as a player, if you send a payment and the sportsbook goes belly up, there is no way of getting your funds back. It works the other way too, if a bookie gives credit to a bettor and the bettor loses but doesn’t pay, there is no legal way the Bookmaker can collect that money.
For this reason alone, we only list sportsbooks on our site that have been in business for a long time and with no blemishes in paying bettors. If a sportsbook is not listed here, please contact us or just choose one that we have here.
