Recently, we witnessed a landmark event in the online poker industry.
In fact, the FBI seized the domain names of the three most important sites in the U.S. market. The officials of PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and Absolute Poker are charged with bank fraud, illegal organization of gambling and money laundering.

Inaccessible Sites

In recent days, U.S. players who try to visit one of the three sites will come across a page with the logo of the FBI and the Justice Department. A text warns that the domain name has been seized by the FBI following the issuance of an arrest warrant.

The penalties

The 3 founders of the sites plus 8 others were indicted by the FBI for violating the law on gambling. 3 of them have already been arrested. They all face a 5 year prison sentence for illegally providing online games, 20 years for money laundering and 30 years for bank fraud. In all, everyone can get up to 55 years in prison, including a fine which currently amounts to 7.5 billion dollars. Such a sum could put an end to online poker in the U.S. market.

The concern of operators and players

For now, none of the three sites has yet re-opened in the United States. Thus, concern is growing in the industry and a question remains on everyone's lips: what will be the long-term consequences of such an event? On the other hand, the members of the 3 sites are wondering if they will one day recover their money because, for now, all player accounts have been seized.