When the United States Government passed the Port Act they also put into law an add-on known as UIGEA. UIGEA is the acronym for the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006. What this bill did was make it illegal for banks to conduct financial transactions with online gaming companies.
While it is legal for people to play poker online it become difficult to deposit money or cash out money. This made playing online poker after 2006 very difficult. There were three main companies that continued to serve the United States. These were PokerStars, Full Tilt, and Ultimate Bet.
All of this changed on April 15, 2011. This date has become known as Black Friday. On this day the US government seized control of the domains of all three remaining poker sites that were serving the US market. This caused a tremendous problem for anyone living in the United States. Two problems that were directly caused by the events of Black Friday were the inability to play online poker as well as the inability to withdraw funds. Players who had funds in other online companies were not as lucky.
The US government has used UIGEA to control money that was won on online poker sites. There were many poker players who had their entire bankrolls on these sites and were prevented from accessing it. PokerStars was able to proceed with player withdrawals.
The reason that these sites had to use shady payment processors is that UIGEA made direct bank transactions prohibited. If UIGEA had not be put into place then online poker would be extremely popular and average people could simply deposit using their credit cards or directly from their banks.
The US government using UIGEA to control money has been one of the most devastating things to occur in the online gaming industry. If online poker had been left alone then it would have blossomed into a humongous industry. Due to the interference of governmental legislation there has been a setback.
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