According to Massachusetts state director of the Poker Players Alliance, Randy Castonguay, with further regulation over poker gambling young kids will have a hard time faking their way to poker online riches. In his testimony in Washington at the Joint Committee on Economic Development and Emerging Technologies Hearing on Expanded gaming in the Commonwealth, Castonguay said that, “a regulated marketplace can ensure that underage access is strictly prohibited utilizing sophisticated age-verification technologies…the online game can be regulated to a greater degree than the brick and mortar casino.” While illegal, every time you hear an interview from a young online poker superstar, there’s always mention of dodgy underage poker playing. They managed to get some money online and built it up to a tiny empire all before the age of 18. Phil Ivey himself claimed to use the fake ID of someone named “Jerome” to get into Atlantic City poker rooms before he was of legal gambling age. I’m interested to see if this will actually hold true, that if online poker is regulated and taxed will it be able to keep underage kids from getting their parents credit cards or manage to get money on poker sites some other way. It sounds like an uphill battle to me. Until then, we’ll see how many “Mr. Papagiorgio’s” (National Lampoon’s Vegas vacation) will make it past the cashout window.
