Online gambling has become of the main sources of entertainment in the last couple of years. It makes perfect sense to see why players found it so interesting. They don’t need to spend their valuable time driving to a particular casino. Instead, they can participate in a wide array of different games from the comfort of their homes. Plus, we can see that the situation with the global pandemic of coronavirus only boosted the activities on these kinds of websites.
Due to the lockdown imposed on pretty much every country in the world, we can see that people needed to find some kind of entertainment for themselves. This was a moment when all the players who still prefer real casinos needed to shift their attention on the online casinos, in order to be able to play these games at all. The same thing can be said about sports betting.
In case you are interested in taking a look at a website that can provide you with many different options when it comes to sports betting, be sure to check Wagerdex. It goes without saying that the introduction of the internet had an immense impact on boosting gambling to the worldwide level. To be completely honest, it is now much easier than it has ever been in history.
We know that it was a representation of a social status only a century ago, and only a handful of people in the world had the opportunity to participate. Even though it’s much easier now than it has ever been, we can see that the problems related to the legal issues are pretty much the same as they were before. So, we’ve decided to provide you with some of the commonest ones, for you to be aware of what you can expect.
1. The Question of Legality
We can see that legal regulation about online gambling was pretty non-existing until the last couple of years. So, it was pretty impossible for a player to know if the website, he or she, is interested in playing at is legal at all. It goes without saying that many players were cheated out of their money, for a variety of different reasons. However, now we can say that the situation is much better. Pretty much every casino that can be considered legal has some kind of license that proves its status.
As you can imagine, having these kinds of licenses is highly important since players need protection due to a lot of possibilities for the website owners to scam them. When it comes to the institutions that can provide sites with this kind of licensing, we can say that there are only a couple of them, for obvious reasons. The most prominent one is the UK gambling commission. Furthermore, its followed by the states of Curacao and Gibraltar. Finally, we can say that the Malta Gaming Authority holds one of the top spots.
2. Possible Taxes
As you are perfectly aware, taxes are one of the most important factors in this day and age. Some people would say that paying taxes is much more important than anything else. Now seriously, avoiding to pay these can be a source of many different, mainly legal problems. So, there is absolutely no reason why it shouldn’t be the case with online gambling, right? Plus, it should be said that different countries have completely different systems when it comes to tax regulation.
We’ve mentioned that many counties have regulated this field. But, at the same time, the highest percentage of them didn’t. So, this became a field of many gray activities. But, as soon as some country regulates these, we can see that paying taxes is an absolute must. Therefore, it should be said that every player must inform themselves about the regulation in their country so that they don’t get into trouble. The same goes for the website owners, without a doubt.
3. Protecting Minors
One of the biggest concerns legal systems have about online gambling is the protection of minors. It goes without saying that, even though the appropriate age for grownups is pretty similar in every country and US state, there are some who have different regulations. As you can imagine, it’s either 18+ or 21+. People younger than this age don’t have a legal right to participate in these kinds of games, not online, or in real casinos. At the same time, the website owners need to be careful about how their sites are marketed
It shouldn’t be available to minors in any way. For example, some countries require them to have a question about the player’s age as soon as, he or she, enters the website. Furthermore, a wide array of different casinos will require some kind of identification to approve the particular player to participate in these kinds of games. It’s needless to say that this is a pretty hard thing to check, but it’s certainly not impossible.
4. Regulation in Different Countries
The final factor we would like to talk about is the regulation in different countries. As you can imagine, these regulations are pretty different and you cannot expect to have the same kind of requirements and conditions in different countries. At the same time, you need to be aware of the fact where the website you are playing at is registered at. Thankfully, it’s not hard to see which is the country of origin of that particular website, just click on the “about us” or “additional information” button.
We’ve mentioned that there are many countries that haven’t regulated any part of this field. So, there is a lot of different possibilities for illegal activities. In fact, there are some counties that are often pointed out as main sources of illegal online gambling websites, like San Marino, The Isle of Man, and Luxembourg. But that doesn’t mean that these sites are excluded from these countries. So, you should be pretty careful about which site you are about to choose to test your luck at, without a doubt.