June 15, 2000

Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee, my name is Gerry Waldron, and I represent the National Football League. I appreciate the opportunity to express the NFL's strong support for the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act of 1999. The NFL strongly supports this bill because it would strengthen and extend existing prohibitions on gambling on sports events. The bill comprehensively addresses the most popular form of gambling on the Internet, which is sports gambling. If the lion’s share of gambling on the Internet is sports gambling, the lion’s share of sports gambling is on professional football. Thus, the NFL has a special concern on this matter, and we believe that a bill that addresses sports gambling with enhanced enforcement tools tailored to the Internet helps a great deal to arrest this growing problem. We join the State Attorneys General and other sports leagues in urging adoption of this important legislation.

Simply put, gambling and sports do not mix. Sports gambling threatens the integrity of our games and all the values our games represent—especially to young people. We don’t want our players used as poker chips--on-line or off-line.

For this reason, the NFL has established strict policies relative to gambling in general and sports betting in particular. The League also has been an active proponent of federal efforts to combat sports gambling. We strongly supported the passage of the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992. This law, known as PASPA, prohibits states from legalizing sports betting. Like PASPA, the proposed legislation is a logical and appropriate extension of existing Federal law and policy.

The Internet Gambling Prohibition Act is a necessary and appropriate federal response to a growing problem that, as the State AGs have testified, no collection of states can adequately address. Ten years ago, a gambler might have used the telephone to call his bookie. Today, he or she simply logs on. Gambling businesses around the country—and around the world—have turned to the Internet in an obvious attempt to circumvent the existing prohibitions on gambling contained in the Wire Act and PASPA. Many offshore gambling businesses provide betting opportunities over the Internet, effectively beyond the reach of federal and state law enforcement authorities.

The bill is needed because it updates our laws to reflect new technology. The problem of Internet gambling is significant—and growing. The League is aware of numerous sites that offer U.S. citizens a chance to gamble on NFL games and other sports. And that is just part of the problem. According to recent publications, the Justice Department has estimated that Internet gambling generated $600 million in revenue in 1997 alone. A recent cover story in USA Today predicts that Internet betting will grow to $2.3 billion by 2001. Some scholarly articles and Wall Street reports expect Internet gambling revenue to grow even faster, up to $10 billion by the year 2003.

Internet gambling is successful largely because so little effort is required to participate. Unlike traditional casinos, which require gamblers to travel to the casino and place their bets at that location, Internet gambling allows bettors to access on-line wagering facilities twenty-four hours per day, seven days a week, from the comfort of their home or office. No airfare or lengthy travel time is required. In short, Internet gambling is quick, easy, anonymous, but not painless.

Internet gambling sites are easily accessible and offer a wide range of gambling opportunities from all over the world. Any personal computer can be turned into an unregulated casino where Americans can lose their life savings with the mere click of a mouse. Many of these gambling web sites have been designed to resemble video games, and therefore are especially attractive to children. But gambling—even on the Internet—is not a game. Studies have shown that sports betting is a growing problem for high school and college students, who develop serious addictions to other forms of gambling as a result of being introduced to "harmless" sports wagering. As the Internet reaches more and more college students and schoolchildren, the rate of Internet gambling among young people is certain to rise unless Congress addresses this problem early and effectively.

This legislation is needed because prosecutors lack adequate tools under current law to curb Internet gambling. Asserting jurisdiction over offshore gambling businesses that use the Internet can be problematic. More significantly, the Wire Act does not include direct and effective mechanisms for ensuring termination by Internet service providers of access to online gambling sites. That is why the bill contains carefully negotiated provisions that use a "notice-and-take down" system borrowed from the WIPO bill that this Subcommittee helped write last Congress. The "notice and take down" regime has protections built into it for ISPs. In fact, this bill carefully balances the needs of law enforcement with the efficient operation of Internet service providers. Moreover, the bill makes explicit that ISPs have no duty to monitor usage and if they comply with requests of law enforcement, they will not be subject to prosecution.

Just as Congress enacted the Wire Act to prohibit the use of the telephone as an instrument of gambling, so Congress should now adopt specific legislation to prohibit the use of the Internet as an instrument of gambling. And just as the Wire Act provides an effective mechanism for terminating telephone service to gambling businesses, so the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act, through its injunctive relief provisions, would provide an effective mechanism for terminating or blocking access to gambling sites. In our view, an effective mechanism for terminating or blocking access to illegal gambling sites is critical to the success of Internet gambling legislation.

Left unchecked, Internet gambling threatens to expand exponentially the amount of legalized gambling in our country. Its effects on the integrity of professional and amateur sports and the values they represent are pernicious. Just as Congress intervened to stem the spread of legalized sports gambling in 1992, so it must intervene to stem the spread of Internet gambling today.

In conclusion, we urge this Subcommittee to support the bill as currently drafted. The Internet Gambling Prohibition Act will strengthen the tools available to federal and state law enforcement authorities to prevent the spread of Internet gambling on sports and casino games into every home, office and schoolhouse in this country. It also will send the vital message—to children and adults alike—that gambling on the Internet is wrong. We strongly support the passage of this bill.