New York Online Casinos
New York has a well-regulated, multi-million dollar land-based gambling industry which provides jobs to thousands of the residents of the state. The number of Native American casinos and casino-racetracks located in Franklin, Cattaraugus, Oneida and other counties is rather impressive and if that wasn’t enough, the state allows for online horse race betting and operates its own online lottery. Furthermore, New York was one of the two states that pressured the US Department of Justice into re-interpreting the Federal Wire Act of 1961, which allowed states like Nevada, Delaware and New Jersey to launch the first regulated casino sites in the country.
New York Gambling Laws
Gambling in New York is covered by Sections 5 and 225 of the New York Consolidated Laws. The current regulations focus on punishing illegal gambling operators instead of individual players and haven’t been updated to reflect the popularity of online casino gaming yet. Consequently, there are no laws referring specifically to online gambling, but it’s worth pointing out that all the unlicensed wagers placed within the borders of the state are considered illegal.
All things considered, it would be possible for the local authorities to charge online players with promoting gambling in the second degree, which is a class A misdemeanor. However, New York law enforcement isn’t exactly excited about enforcing these regulations and no online casino customers have been prosecuted so far.
Online Casinos
Despite the fact that New York is probably one of the most gambling-friendly states in the country, the current legal situation is rather unfortunate when it comes to online casino gaming. New York politicians are still arguing how to create an intrastate online gambling market, but the officials have already requested many high-profile sites to leave the local industry alone. Consequently, many excellent Real Time Gaming-powered casino sites were forced to stop offering their services to New York-based customers, leaving the local gambling enthusiasts with an extremely limited number of offshore sites to play on.
Offshore Casino Sites That Accept New York Players
As briefly touched on above, the number of high-profile offshore casino sites that accept New York residents has been significantly reduced over the past few months. However, it is possible to find quality casinos that have no qualms about allowing the local gambling enthusiasts to play their real money games. This means that New York players can still access cutting-edge slots and table games while enjoying all the benefits of playing on major international networks, including lucrative bonuses and humongous jackpots.
As you’ve probably already guessed, New York residents face the same banking problems when dealing with offshore casino sites as all the other Americans. The number of deposit and cash out options supported by those casinos is exceptionally limited, which means that most players have to cover their gambling expenses via credit card payments. Unfortunately, gambling-related credit card transactions tend to get blocked from time to time, which means that finding a card that actually works might require assuming a trial and error approach.
On a brighter note, while withdrawals are available almost exclusively via a wire transfer or a check by courier, they are 100% reliable, which means that your winnings will always arrive on time as long as you stick to reputable sites.
Developing Legal Scenarios
The New York Online Gambling Bill has made its way into the State Assembly in May 2014 after a similar bill was introduced in the State Senate. The new legislation seems to be predominantly about online poker, but since most of the local lawmakers seem to be interested in bringing New York up to speed with Nevada and the other i-gaming-friendly states, it wouldn’t be a stretch to assume that New York-regulated casino sites are more than likely to appear online in the foreseeable future.
