Dozens of companies offer online gaming in Finnish

Marketing foreign-based gambling websites illegal - playing on them is not

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Dozens of gaming foreign-based websites have been set up with instructions in Finnish, on which people can play poker and other casino games. One more is expected to make its debut in March, and in August the Finnish Slot Machine Association (RAY) will launch its online gambling site.
      Nearly all of the sites skirt around Finnish law. In Finland, legal gambling activities are limited to RAY, as well as the lottery and sports gambling company Veikkaus, and the harness racing site Fintoto.
      The others operate from abroad.
     
“Sixty-three companies offered online gaming in Finnish last year”, says Jouni Laiho, the administrative head of lotteries in the Finnish Police Administration.
      The number is growing this year. The Maltese company Mr. Green is expanding its services to Finland, offering “high-class casino atmosphere on the Internet”, says Kati Niemelä, the company’s representative in Finland.
     
RAY will introduce online versions of all of its slot machines and table games. Janne Peräkylä, the head of RAY’s gaming activities, expects that RAY will rapidly get a clientele of more than 100,000 players for its online services.
      Peräkylä believes that both the online gaming sites and RAY’s modernised traditional casino facilities will attract sufficient numbers of players.
      “The old gambling machines are to be networked in order to allow for electronic payment.”
      This would allow RAY to directly debit a customer’s gaming account for using a fruit machine.
     
Gamblers at the RAY Täyspotti arcades predicted a rocky road ahead for RAY’s plans to introduce Internet-based gambling.
      Toomas Tammeorg, who was playing a fruit machine at the Täyspotti at the Pasila railway station in Helsinki, said that he would not play RAY games online.
      “I don’t think that the games will thrive. The popularity of the games is based on the possibility to pop in and play while passing by. The Internet is better for strategic games, not for fruit machines”, said Tammeorg, who says he has tried playing online poker.
      RAY press spokeswoman Tuula Lehto says that RAY is offering a “more cautious option” for playing online.
      RAY will keep tabs on the gamers’ identities, and a direct link to the player’s bank account will be needed. There will be no gambling on credit.
     
The Supreme Court ruled recently that an online gaming company that allows Finns to play its games would be guilty of a crime. Jouni Laiho says that the same policy is reflected in decisions by the European Court of Justice.
      The practice is different, however. For instance, the Åland-based PAF is still operating. A request that its activities be investigated lapsed when no charges were filed.
     
Players in Finland can play online games even if the company has no licence. However, such a company is not allowed to promote its products.
      Lappeenranta District Court recently imposed a fine on the editor of a local free-distribution newspaper for allowing an online poker site to advertise in the publication. The decision has been appealed.
     
A bill for a new law on lotteries might clarify the policy. The measure, which is currently before Parliament, would allow officials to impose an order to cease and desist, or impose cautionary fines.
      However, Finnish authorities would not have jurisdiction over other countries, which means that the Maltese-based firm would be unaffected by decisions of the Finnish Parliament.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Publication fined for poker advertising (3.2.2010)
  Finland´s Slot Machine Association prepared to launch online poker in 2010 (29.4.2009)
  EU court proposal would allow Finland to restrict online gambling (4.11.2008)

Links:
  Finnish Sloth Machine Association (RAY)

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