Editor's Note: The Isle of Man Gambling Control Commissioners sent us this response to the article Hard Rock Casino Moving to Alderney published earlier this week.

Winneronline:

When the Rank organisation applied for an online licence to operate the branded Hardrockcasino.com gaming site from the Isle of Man the organisation as others were in full knowledge of the provisions of the Online Gambling Regulation Act 2001 and its associated regulations. To date this legislation has not been amended.

The two core concerns of players within the internet environment was and remains that:

a)the games could be so rigged to avoid pay out and
b) payments to players of their winnings would be met.

These are and will remain the two core elements of the player protection legislation for persons playing within the site of an Isle of Man licenceholder a commodity that one would expect in any regulated terrestrial casino environment.

In the case of a) the games are independently tested and b) a £2M bond is required to ensure that players receive their correct winnings if the licenceholder were to close for whatever reason.

Therefore, in order for this dedicated Isle of Man bond to be rightfully returned to the licenceholder all player accounts held by an Isle of Man entity are required to be returned prior to closure. This is because, we as a jurisdiction, cannot confirm similar player protection exist on transfer to any another jurisdiction, player protection that the registrants will have been aware of on registration from an operation within this jurisdiction.

The reasoning behind the decision for Hardrockcasino .com to relocate are entirely different to the decisions reached by both Casino Atlantis and MGM Mirage to close, the true reasoning may well become apparent in the course of time.

Despite recent setbacks in this variant of the gambling industry, the Isle of Man remains fully committed in this consolidating industry and is more than well placed legislatively and geographically with a sound and resilient telecommunication infrastructure for this industry to continue to develop through the next phase of evolution in a safe and secure manner.

Online gaming is only the latest facet of an established gambling industry both terrestrially and interactively available in and from the island.

We are presently witnessing much interest in online betting operations of which two known branded operations have recently been licensed and will commence operations from the island shortly.