Quote:
Originally Posted by jackbl
They always can come out with new way of gambling 
Football gambling goes virtual in Vietnam
================================================== = |
Gambling via mobile phone, the new trend
=================================================
For gamblers in Vietnam, online games are old hat; the latest trick is gambling on mobile phone networks.
In a country where gambling and betting are totally banned, ironically, the gambling services are being publicly provided by the Hanoi-based Bien Xanh (Blue Sea) media and technology company via its website
www.doden.vn.
The website is lawful and registered to offer online games, lottery results, and chat forums.
To gamble on it, a punter needs to have a mobile phone enabled with GPRS, the mobile data transfer service, and sign up for membership to access the online games.
A member can log into different rooms offering games like chess, poker, and dozens of other card games.
The poker room is divided into sub-rooms depending on the stakes involved in each game – VND1,000, VND5,000, and so on.
Punters can buy virtual money known as Xu, Keng, Un, or Ro depending on the game, to gamble by paying real money which will just get deducted from their mobile phone account upon sending an SMS.
But what happens mostly is that the gamblers, who cannot redeem their winnings from the website, just do so from each other. In other words, winners sell their virtual money to other gamblers.
Websites like
www.doden.vn entice gamblers with thinly disguised exhortations like “Mobile phone users can well interact with one another for online chess / card games.”
Tuoi Tre witnessed many gamblers playing in poker rooms late at night, with some owning up to 138 million Ro of virtual money.
Tuoi Tre contacted an official at Bien Xanh company and was informed that the firm operates the website with a license.
However, the firm does flout current regulations that service providers can only provide online games 14 hours a day with a break from 10:00 pm to 8:00 am.
Besides, the rules also require players to declare their personal identification to get membership.
Tran Vuong Thao, a Ho Chi Minh City lawyer, said a games provider violating the law could be fined up to VND50 million (US$2,380), while anyone found guilty of gambling could be imprisoned for at least three months.