From Poker News Daily – Greece’s Commission for the Supervision and Control of Games (CSCG), a division of the Hellenic Gaming Commission, has published a 401-member blacklist of online gambling sites that will supposedly be prohibited from operating in the Mediterranean nation.
The list will be sent to Greek internet service providers, who will be instructed to deny subscribers’ access to the sites. It will also be sent to the Bank of Greece so it can stop the flow of funds to and from the sites, as well as law enforcement agencies to assist in unlawful gambling investigations.
The blacklist contains a mix of poker, casino, and sports betting sites, though it does appear to be made of mostly casino sites (likely because those types of sites are more prolific than poker sites).
Greece has perhaps the most controversial online gaming regulations in Europe. The government strongly favors the Greek Organisation of Football Prognostics S.A., better known as OPAP, which already holds a land-based monopoly on casino gaming. Until October 12th, 2020, OPAP is the only provider which can offer online sports betting, poker cash games, and many casino games. All others, provided they receive a license, will only be allowed to offer “casino-type games of chance, the results of which are not provided by a random number generator as in poker tournaments.” Go ahead, make sense of that.
