Google, YouTube Should Fear Ramifications of UIGEA

In a bid to have the Unlawful Internet Gambling and Enforcement Act stopped in its tracks, a grass roots group has sought an injunction against the enforcement of this law in the US courts. They point to long term ramifications of such enforcement and how the UIGEA could act as a test case to go after all Internet websites including Google and its newly acquired YouTube video uploading website.

So just what is the UIGEA?

The UIGEA was a measure to prevent banking institutions from allowing transactions for online gambling. This measure could not pass through Congress on its own so the legislation's co-authors, Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona and former Iowa representative, Jim Leach, somehow managed to persuade then Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to attach the bill to an unrelated port security act. The port security act was identified as legislation that would receive unanimous bi-partisan support. It went through along with the UIGEA attachment. President George W. Bush essentially signed into law the Port Security Act, perhaps not even bothering to read the irrelevant anti-online gambling measure that hijacked it.

The banking institutions had 270 days to come up with a plan, converse about these plans and make any necessary changes. That 270 day period is supposed to be up by mid-July. This request for an injunction essentially will temporarily stop the banks from having to enforce whatever policies may have been created over the past few months until the courts can hear all arguments against the UIGEA. Assuming the IME&GA's request is accepted by the court (the chances are very good that it will be), then that looming mid-July deadline date basically gets extended.

Joe Brennan Jr. is not an attorney and he's not necessarily someone embroiled in the online gambling industry. Instead, he is a long time Internet marketer who once held a pivotal position with AOL. He was formerly the Director of Interactive Strategy at AOL.

Brennan sees the UIGEA as potentially having long term ramifications on the Internet as a whole, with both Google and its YouTube subsidiary becoming key targets.

"A few months back some High School girls uploaded a video of them beating up on another girl," Brennan illustrates. "Google and YouTube had nothing to do with posting this video; it was done so against their policy and they removed it immediately once they got knowledge of its existence."

There were no lawsuits filed related to the uploading of this video. But Brennan's outlook points to a scenario where attorneys will jump all over Google and YouTube for similar occurrences in the future. If the UIGEA is allowed to stand as is, the banks could ultimately be held responsible for any online gambling transaction that goes undetected and so to can Google be held responsible for any offensive uploaded video that appears on YouTube before they gain wind of it.

"The UIGEA is a pretext to wage war on the entire Internet," Brennan says. "Just imagine what they can do."

Already, the US government has gone after one of the world's most trafficked websites: MySpace.com.

Last year, Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal investigated whether criminal charges can be brought against the site's operators after seven teenage girls claimed to have been sexually assaulted by men they met through MySpace.com. The girls say they were fondled or had sex with men who turned out to be older than they claimed.

Since this time, MySpace.com has routinely been asked to cooperate in turning over confidential user information.

"The Internet is self-governing," Brennan insists. "If they (the US government) go after Internet gambling, what's to stop them from going after Internet dating, role playing games."

And, yes, even Google.

The website for http://www.imega.org/ will be up and running shortly. Brennan's organization will look to gather as much support from the Internet community as a whole.

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Internet Gambling Prohibition has Long Term Ramifications for World Wide Web

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Christopher Costigan, Gambling911.com

Originally published June 7, 2007 7:25 pm ET