President Barack Obama has not yet once publicly given his opinion about the future of the US online casino gambling industry. A lot of industry analysts over the past nearly two years have hypothesized that the Obama administration was a safer bet for the internet gambling industry because Obama’s platform included promises to stop unnecessary internet censorship. Additionally, Obama is a poker player himself and there was a certain level of assumption throughout the industry that this would give him an additional level of leniency when it came to the online casinos and the Bush-era legislation that banned and blocked US offshore internet gambling.

Since Obama took office however, there has been absolutely no information released from Obama’s office about plans for the US online casino gambling industry. That silence made some uneasy while others were willing to give the President a pass on the issue because of all of the economy and health care concerns he is handling right now. Rumors and speculation within the gambling industry right now are circulating that all of the Department of Justice action against the online casinos and the in-country payment processing are extensions of Obama’s hidden and secret polices that are in support of a closed US internet gambling market.

The DoJ seized several key bank accounts that were processing transactions for the foreign online casinos and poker sites and sealed warrants had given the US officials the right to confiscate the player money that was resting in these accounts. These actions confused a lot within the industry but still did not fully dissuade many from assuming that Obama was just too busy to publicly announce his support for the internet gambling industry. That is clearly not the case if the current information is in fact 100 percent accurate and Obama is specifically targeting the gambling money of US citizens.

An abrupt change this week in the plea agreement between the US authorities and former BetonSports CEO, David Carruthers, has a lot of people in the government and the online casino gambling industry a bit confused. Carruthers has had this plea arrangement in place since April and he would be walking away a free man in just days had he stuck to the plea arrangement. Carruthers is among the handful of executives and BetonSports employees that are facing some very hefty charges in the US for their involvement in illegal online casino gambling and betting activities in the US market. Carruthers accepted the plea deal and a great deal of his charges were dropped by the government in exchange for his help and his guilty plea.

Interesting enough, perhaps his conscience struck him because he withdrew the guilty plea this week even though he was to go up for sentencing on Friday. There was every expectation that the judge would accept Carruther’ guilty plea and time served under house arrest as sufficient to fulfill the three year sentence he accepted as a part of the plea agreement. But as a part of the agreement Carruthers was going to have to testify in court against Gary Kaplan and others that are still facing trials for their interaction in the former online casino betting company.

There has been no indication of why Carruthers chose to withdraw his guilty plea consider he could have been off house arrest in just days. The government prosecutors accepted his change to a not-guilty plea and this means that the case is back to square one and Carruthers is once again facing as many as 20 years in prison for his actions in the US online casino gambling and betting industry.

Full Tilt is in hot water this month as a lawsuit processes through the California courts against the popular poker room. Full Tilt is an international online casino poker gambling brand that operates out of the Indian land owned by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission according to the company. A player in California has filed a lawsuit against the poker room on the claims that Full Tilt is manipulating and falsifying hand results using poker bots. Additionally, and extremely damaging are the claims that Full Tilt is operating out of the United States. The US has very strict policies against the internet gambling industry and online casinos and internet gambling sites have fled the market in recent years in fear of the US Department of Justice’s actions.

The current claims against Full Tilt are quite severe and would damage the high reputation that the online casino poker site enjoys internationally. Poker scandals were uncovered several years ago at two poker sites operating out of the Kahnawake Gaming Commission and these scandals were on such a scale that they rocked the foundation of the gambling industry when they hit the media. In this case though, there is no indication of the full truth to the Full Tilt players’ claims. The lawsuit alleges that the company itself is using poker bots to manipulate poker hands in favor of the company.

Even further though, the player alleges that the online casino poker gambling site has also seized player account funds under the allegation that the players are using poker bots to play the games. The company seizes the funds and often bans those player from gambling on the site. Lary Kennedy is the long-time Full Tilt player in question who has taken the issue to the courts in hopes of uncovering some unsavory situation.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in the UK has banned a Betfair advertisement on the basis that the online casino poker gambling company was targeting advertisements toward underage gamblers. Betfair has acknowledged that the advertisements were not intended for the UK market and has willingly pulled all ads that feature Annette Obrestad without fighting the ASA for the ruling. The current concern rising in the market though is the fear that the damage has already been done and yet there have been no repercussions for Betfair’s very blatant and obvious mistake on this online casino poker advertising campaign.

Other online casinos and internet poker gambling companies have made mistakes in the past several years following the slightly imprecise and interpretable policies in place as a part of the 2005 UK Gambling Act. But the difference in this case is the fact that Betfair knew that the advertisements were grossly unacceptable for use in the UK market and that they violated CAP Code because of the clear and blatant age issue with Annette Obrestad as the spokesperson.

The ASA has only given Betfair a mild slap on the wrist and asked that the ads featuring Obrestad be completely pulled. With the damage already done though, and the ad has already obtained a lot of widespread visibility in the market and exposure before the ASA got involved, some of the online casino gambling community are asking for harsher punishments for internet gambling companies that clearly violate advertising standards. At this point the situation is likely a moot point but perhaps in the coming years the ASA will develop more stringent standards regarding repercussions for companies running inappropriate adverts in the UK.

The UK has very tight standards when it comes to the very liberalized online casino gambling industry in the country. Although the UK’s liberal standards and regulations mean that the internet gambling sites are able to make use of advertising dispensations and other extensive and marketing opportunities there are protocols in place and the companies have to live up to the advertising restrictions that the Advertising Standards Authority in the UK enforces. Betfair entered the spotlight this month because the online casino gambling company launched an advertising campaign featuring Annette Obrestad and the number 15, alleging implying that Obrestad could be as young as 15 in the advertisements.

The ASA is very strict about age targeting within advertisements – this is actually a key concern. Underage gambling is a growing problem in the global online casino gambling industry and the ASA banned the latest Betfair advertisement because it could seemingly be interpreted to be targeted at the 15 year olds. Basically, the advertisement used the handle “Annette_15” for Obrestad and then a tagline that specifically talks about age. There could arguably be a case about the validity of the advertisement if the Betfair ad team hadn’t chosen the tagline “Online experience is measured in games, not years.”

The tagline is extremely fitting for Obrestad, who is a very young and highly notable female land and online casino poker gambler. She won the World Series of Poker and is a great brand spokesperson – except for the fact that although she is definitely old enough to gamble, she looks much younger. The ASA received complaints about the advertisement and has since a banned the advertisement. Betfair acknowledged the validity of the ban and noted that the UK advertising campaign was not supposed to feature Obrestad.

Internet skill gaming website WorldWinner has launched its latest online casino games, a cash game version of Hasbro’s classic mystery game in the whodunnit genre, ‘Clue’.

To crack the case in “Clue Mystery Match!”, players match identical cards in three separate rounds to identify the murder weapon, location and perpetrator of the crime through a process of elimination. Was it Mrs. Peacock in the study with a lead pipe? All of Clue’s classic characters make a cameo appearance in the online version of the game.

“Between the list of suspects, crime locations and murderous weapons, Clue has kept generations of game lovers guessing,” said Peter Blacklow, president of WorldWinner. “Now, we’ve taken the game of deductive reasoning and added a skill-based, memory-challenging twist where online players can challenge one another to achieve high scores and win cash prizes. Given our players’ enthusiasm for previously adapted Hasbro titles, we’re confident WorldWinner players are up for the Clue Mystery Match! challenge.”

The game is essentially a memory test where players uncover one element of the murder mystery in each round of match making. The one remaining unmatched card at the end of each round leads players to the murder weapon, location and suspect. When a match of two cards is removed from the board, players have the added challenge of the “gravity affect” where remaining cards collapse in to the now open spaces.

Players score points for making matches, as well as a time bonus based on how quickly all matches are made.

“Clue Mystery Match” joins a stable of online skill games developed from Hasbro games and offered by WW, including Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit, and Scrabble. New Internet skill games currently being developed from Hasbro licensed products, include Twister! and Battleship.