(no subject)
Here's something I thought Norway had quit decades ago....
The norwegian government, which is already strict on gambling, has tried curbing gambling-addiction.
The first move was to remove slot machines from shopping centres, replacing them with government controlled ones that are "not too addictive" and where you identify yourself with a player card, so that a single person can only play for a set amount of money per month.
But there are a lot of internet gambling sites, so wouldn't the addicts just turn to computers and play somewhere out of reach of the norwegian government? The anarchic internet that is outside government control and everything. yadayada.
Not so fast! Every place that accepts a credit or debit card is registered with a code specifying what kind of place they are. A grocery has one code, a hotel another, a casino or gambling site a third. What the government has done is to decide that effective from the 1st of june, all norwegian banks should block transactions to companies registered with the gambling code. If a norwegian go to a gambling website today, he will not be able to use his card there.
This in effect increases the state's jurisdiction over a norwegian citizen abroad too. Today, if a norwegian tries to gamble in Monte Carlo og Las Vegas, his card will not work there. Not even in hotels if they are registered under the same company as a casino.
It is of course possible to circumvent this, be it transferring money via a third party or withdrawing money from an ATM outside the casino, but I thought that the norwegian state had stopped following the prohibition line. This is the same state that outlawed skateboards through much of the 80's, due to the risk of injury they posed.
Norway extends its jurisdiction in other ways too. *) For a few years, it has been illegal to pay for prostitution. Not only in Norway, but it is illegal for a norwegian citizen to go to a prostitute abroad, regardless of the local laws. The difference is that while that law is mostly a deterrent that is rarely enforced, the "law" against gambling is enforced automatically through electronic means. Not through fines after the fact but by blocking the gambling from taking place at all. This is exactly what Frank Furedi wrote about in his book code and other laws of cyberspace. When the state extends to the internet and cyberspace, laws and law enforcement is partially replaced with code. Code that, in principle, stop the unlawful act from happening at all.
*) Jurisdiction over citizens abroad is nothing new, take the travel restrictions for US citizens to cuba for instance, or the ban on trade with certain items in the east block during the cold war.
The norwegian government, which is already strict on gambling, has tried curbing gambling-addiction.
The first move was to remove slot machines from shopping centres, replacing them with government controlled ones that are "not too addictive" and where you identify yourself with a player card, so that a single person can only play for a set amount of money per month.
But there are a lot of internet gambling sites, so wouldn't the addicts just turn to computers and play somewhere out of reach of the norwegian government? The anarchic internet that is outside government control and everything. yadayada.
Not so fast! Every place that accepts a credit or debit card is registered with a code specifying what kind of place they are. A grocery has one code, a hotel another, a casino or gambling site a third. What the government has done is to decide that effective from the 1st of june, all norwegian banks should block transactions to companies registered with the gambling code. If a norwegian go to a gambling website today, he will not be able to use his card there.
This in effect increases the state's jurisdiction over a norwegian citizen abroad too. Today, if a norwegian tries to gamble in Monte Carlo og Las Vegas, his card will not work there. Not even in hotels if they are registered under the same company as a casino.
It is of course possible to circumvent this, be it transferring money via a third party or withdrawing money from an ATM outside the casino, but I thought that the norwegian state had stopped following the prohibition line. This is the same state that outlawed skateboards through much of the 80's, due to the risk of injury they posed.
Norway extends its jurisdiction in other ways too. *) For a few years, it has been illegal to pay for prostitution. Not only in Norway, but it is illegal for a norwegian citizen to go to a prostitute abroad, regardless of the local laws. The difference is that while that law is mostly a deterrent that is rarely enforced, the "law" against gambling is enforced automatically through electronic means. Not through fines after the fact but by blocking the gambling from taking place at all. This is exactly what Frank Furedi wrote about in his book code and other laws of cyberspace. When the state extends to the internet and cyberspace, laws and law enforcement is partially replaced with code. Code that, in principle, stop the unlawful act from happening at all.
*) Jurisdiction over citizens abroad is nothing new, take the travel restrictions for US citizens to cuba for instance, or the ban on trade with certain items in the east block during the cold war.