Bitcoin Forum

The newly elected President Rodrigo Duterte wants to stop the online gambling here in the Philippines. Its because they cannot collect tax from it and they don't want people to become addicted to it. What is your side ?

And what's next? Banning the use of bitcoin because banks don't regulate it? I gamble sometimes for fun but I don't think government should ban gambling. They can implement a way to collect tax from it if that is what they want or put a surveilance if they want to moderate it but banning? I think that's ridiculous.

The one that will only affected is those company na nakabased dito sa country. Iyong mismong nagooperate dito ng online gambling which is under licensed by PAGCOR Philippines.

So nothing to worry about if we will take it sa mga usual gambling type na ginagawa natin dito especially using our bitcoin. If balak nila yan parang ang hirap isipin kung how they will do some moves para di natin mapasok ang mga bitcoin gambling sites.

[EDIT]

I thought Im on local section.

Translation:

The one that will only affected is those company which is based in our country (PH). Those who are operating online gambling that has licensed to operate by the PAGCOR Philippines.

So nothing to worry about if we will take it to our usual gambling type especially using our bitcoin. If the government really wants to ban that , I can't think of a way they can stop us from visiting online gambling sites which are based outside of the country.

I think it is not a serious problem for real gamblers because there are many ways to access online gambling site even though your government ban it.
So you do not need to worry about it imo, online gambling is also illegal in my country but in fact there are still many local online gambling sites exist and have many active players.

Actually you have a point, they cannot ban the gambling sites outside our country BUT. They can ban the bitcoin accounts that involves gambling. Example, here we are using coins.ph as bitcoin wallet. Once they traced that the transaction is from gambling. They are banning this account. And worst, the balance from that account is not refundable. Sad to those who lost their balance . That's how they control online gambling from other countries.

It is impossible to ban online gambling for any government when with help of modern technology players get access to there easily and there are so many alternate ways exist, I think people wouldn't care too much about this.

FYI Mark, Gambling is already against coins.ph TOS. Before signing up for a wallet you should read their TOS first to avoid problem. They will surely ban you if they trace that you are getting money from a gambling source be it with the Presidents order or without.
He's been hunting all the drug involved citizens right from his 1st day as a President. A lt of people has already dies and was put to jail, even police officials. I wouldn't be surprised if he will implement such big move on the internet if he wanted to. :D

Yes, it is not that easy to Ban Online gambling. There are some online gambling sites are there how can they ban all sites. And if people play online gaming means how can they catch people, Crores of people will use do gambling so the government will not find all them right. So I think Online gambling will never ban in any country.

if gambling online really banned in your country philippines i think you should be follow the rules who available in your country because if your government want to stop gambling online then those activities will be prohibit and illegal also if you still start to gambling with casinos online and got caught you can be got in jail and this is bad for you

There are services like VPNs, Tor and tails. It's easy to get pass any restrictions and Philippines government should rather focus on catching criminals rather than online gamblers.

Well, i think so if addicted in gambling isn't good for someone (maybe he can lost all his money, and then searching for loan, after that he cant repay the loan, and finally hes ended in jail). but if you want still gambling, you still can change your IP by using VPN, right?

i don't think banning it would solve anything. first of all gambling has been very huge in Philippines as far as i know. and online gambling is only a new thing that came to exist recently. so their worrying about people getting addicted to it is nonsense. so if taxes is the only problem they have with gambling they can easily regulate online gambling sites and take taxes that way because banning it would only lead people to use VPNs and TOR more.

It is always good to suppress gambling even in a small way, even if we think this will not solve anything, I think it will solve something, small by small pieces, will always turn big, and we will see its result, just support him.

i think this only applies to those online casino that has a permit to operate issued by pagcor, not on those sites that we used to play. i only played one online casino which is playtongits i dont know if that one will be shutdown.

Banning online gambling wont change anything it will only affect the ones that has a permit or affiliated with PAGCOR,
but the ones that is outside the country wont be affected even if they put a firewall people can still play using Virtual Private Network.
why not just Pass a Bill. to allow government to collect taxes on online gambling just like they did to Tabbaco/Cigarette.

I also think that is not a solution to make stop the people to do gamble, it is not a good decision as I think about this to ban the online gambling in any country because it demand very advanced technology to prohibit the access through internet there but I am not sure it will be helpful for them.

its this all along? I had it in my mind that its for online gambling purposes  that he wants the Internet service providers in the country to comply and provide better connection. Damn Digong you're making it hard for us, I just bought a lot BRK.

In think its because they can't collect tax from it. People are greedy and everyone wants a slice of the pie. I believe people should have the freedom to make their own mistakes and not be dictated over like some child.

Actually my country also ban online gambling. It is one of the first few country to embrace on btc and even used to have atm for btc. However, if it is related to online gambling, the government is still against the idea. They have already ban those popular gambling sites and even gave us a year of time frame to withdraw everything from those websites.

People should have the freedom to make their own mistakes? wth?

The president is a reasonable man and so he wants the Filipino people not to get into gambling for it ruins life that instead of buying food thru the hard earn money that they toil from their 9-5 day construction job, they lose these money in gambling. imagine what will happen if people lose their money everyday. They'll gonna lose their minds too while they turn to each other like bunch of animals.

It depend on goverment policy that have decide with other staff before take this wise decision.
There are many advantage for goverment to doing this but for other loss there will be more unemployee wondering looking for other job

I think they can't ban it entirely , I know that gambling is widely spreaded in Philippines , but this action consider as restriction of freedoms , look at a lot of european nations , they permit gambling and in the same time they are very effictive nations , because they consider gambling a way for fun , the solve comes from awareness not from restriction .

I think this should be a law in every country. People get wayyyy too addicted. With normal gambling you can at least stay away from the casinos but if it's online you could just play 24/7 and never ever stop until you're out of money. I think it's for the best. Gambling seems to be a huge sickness in the bitcoin community.

Yeah i heard that but i think they can not now while we are collecting bitcoin that we are gamble its impossible that  they can trace our funds from gambling casino many way to be still anonymous using bitmixer.. so we are still free to gamble using bitcoin..
But if you make it business you use your bitcoin and people buy bitcoins to you to use as credit in gambling site its a big problem if someone reported you..

Is this only bitcoin wallet you can use in your country? Others are banned or what? And how can they trace you and prove that you get coins from gambling? Mix coins? Withdraw it to exchange, from exchange to your wallet?

Not to challenge the administration but how will they track those who play online gambling and how  can they track which gambling site?  
Seem a hard work, would it be easy for them to block blockchain itself?  ;D  

Anyway, I'm willing to stop though, i don't earn thru gambling anyway. I just play extra coins I have when there is but most of the time I buy altcoins to trade.

Its a bad news for those who addicted in gambling.. we are not affected here if we are not addicted in gambling only for those who addicted in gambling.. so philippines bitcoin users will not affect while you are collecting bitcoin..

Sounds like they sad because they want a cut so they just ban it. Also we using bitcoins and i'm sure they don't like that either since they can't trace it well or control it for their own profits. Governments love control. Do not fool yourself into believing the government wants to protect you. Banning anything protects noone. It just give law enforcement more excuses to do as they wish under the "law".

People always find the ways to keep gambling wherever it is banned or illegal in form of online. Philippines government can not bane it totally as who is addicted and used to gamble will go out of the way to do this. It will be good for vpn service providers to make their business good by filling the space by giving access to those gamblers.

i think online gambling is already banned in so many other countries mostly in Islamic countries. not only online gambling but all other types and form of gambling are banned in so many countries. so may be it also banned in Philippine but i have no such news about this. and not even heard on social midia.

Banning gambling is not right thing to do, in any country. People should be free to choose and do what they like, and there is nothing good in banning things like gambling, good question is what is next? Bitcoin maybe? I hope things will not come that far, and if that happen eventually I`m sure people will find a way to continue with gambling.
I know its not easy when we are forced to something "illegal" and something that is forbidden, constant fear from police and other government forces. I think not all laws are good, and I`m for freedom of choice, so my stand about this things is very clear. I believe their agenda is pretty obvious, they just wish to take some money from that, with this proposition they shaken things and maybe they wait someone to offer them a bribe.

If they want to ban it because of tax, then it is not good thing for their country as it shows that their country is weaker in that field and are unable to make the system to collect the tax, they should have to make a system with which they can collect tax.

Some people are stupid or addicted and gamble even when they can't afford it, but I don't think anybody or any government should be allowed to tell people what they can and can't do with their own money.  It's nobody's business except the person who owns the money.  If the Philippines do end up outlawing gambling online, you can always use TOR or a VPN to continue playing online.

just simply can't collect tax  and then ban gambling? lmao what this logic is. ;D
let's down with the death punishment as well. :P

There is many jobs out there, not only in gambling paltforms, LOL, can you imagine how many more families are being ruined because of gambling more than some others that they can help due to having jobs.

Yes Indeed ! If they really want to stop gambling in our country then they should close all the Casinos out here. But they cant, because Casinos generate a high amount of tax. Which they value the most. Many people lost their money in casinos than online gambling. The point is, they cannot collect proper taxes from online gambling and many gamblers tend to gamble online because there is a higher chance of winning in online gambling than in the Casinos.

I heard the news, This will not happen because they will not be able to control everyone from accessing the internet.But if this will really be implement. We can use Proxy changer, Ip changer or VPN to have access or to be able to gamble again.

Gambling should be banned all over the world. It causes many disadvantages such as stealing, scamming and other because of gambling. The president did the right decision in banning it in Philippines. Of course, many will lost their jobs to those who are working in online gambling sites. We cannot deny the fact that for every decisions, there are pros and cons. Maybe he should provide some help or job offers to those affected by its ordinance.

Well online gambling is illegal in the United states but you still see people from there using those sites. Just because they say it is banned doesn't mean people won't still use those sites. Come on now!  >:(
It is the internet after all. Unless they get smart and block all the sites from the country just like China has with google at a time before.  ::)

Holy shit! ^ Now that I can believe! Coming from someone who were accused of scamming someone too, i bet you learned that first hand experienced. right on brother! And i guess you never got into gambling because you're sticking to what you do best like doubler right? 

I think they should allow it, but how are they going to know if people are gambling online? Are they going to block gambling websites? If not, then how do they know who is gambling if it is done with cryptocurrencies?

Hahaha so many countries want to ban online gambling.
So many governement and politcs are mad because they cannot take tax out of it,but if they would legalize marijuana and take tax out of it,they probably would earn like 2x time more than taxing online gambling.
Logic...

Thats their problem its not our problem honestly even they are banned those sites we can still gamble there and we can use vpn to bypass..
So they can not prevent filipinos if they want to gamble online..

As what i have heard, this drive have nothing to do with gambling based outside the Philippines.  They are only after the online gambling that were based locally and are not regulated by PAGCOR.  Basicaly, this drive is to trimdown competition as we all know, PAGCOR is a gambling department itself and was not ordered to shutdown.  So if President Duterte is really serious on stopping gambling , they shoud and must shutdown PAGCOR's online betting sites and then dismantle PAGCOR itself.

Its where they get funds to cure the gambling addict as well so not possible.  :o The funds for the free hospitalization and 911 are from Philippine sweepstakes too so that at least they know where the money goes.  For online gambling, its totally different and for all we know  the money goes to the pocket of General Garbo. :)  don't quote that.

Thank God for that ^^ I wouldn't wanna live in a world where we can't do anything because everything is banned to "protect us" and everything is controlled. Good thing this is not the case and not everything can be controlled so yes that doesn't stop people. The government can't really control everything we do. Just because something is banned or is a law doesn't mean its enforced. Just on paper its breaking the law but in practice it doesn't work quite like that.

Lol i never knew that online gambling is really forbidden in the U.S,but thank's a lot Cerberus,now i know thanks to you!
Actually i would never though that U.S would implement something stupid like that but well... what can i do :(

Not all states though.
US law will actually find these individuals same thing as how they find those who download stuff illegally as far as i know.
This is why you see users here are using VPN to conceal their IPs to which they can be traced as to where they are from.

The government can collect tax from online gambling by allowing only licensed online gambling websites to operate in that jurisdiction. By licensed casinos and sportsbooks I mean companies that pay the government cash to allow them to do business in the country. It's a common practice around the world and to be honest no one cares if the people will get addicted or not it's about collecting taxes on the gambling profits that's all.

They can't. Its like an unwritten rule. They have no one to enforce it and have other things to worry about like actual crime. If they could they would stop btc all together because they want the tax for it. Btc stands for everything the government is opposed to. That's why they doing this. Just scare tactics.

Why do you think that these casinos move their licensing to other countries that those governments have no arm's reach in. Like dominican republlic or Puerto Rico. They don't care for American laws even though they take in imports from them  ::)  They only care for the money that they are raking in and it is alot of American dollars that they are whoring themselves over from these so called illegal gambling practices. :P

Absolutely right he is doing in my opinion, well you see the threads here which say how dangerous gambling is and how difficult is to stop gambling once fell with its addiction. I am with yes.

I see the you have made the "cannot collect tax from it" bold. It's almost as if you disregarded the other reason "they don't want people to become addicted to it." I can't blame you, though. Our nature is to only look at the negative part of things not just in this situation but in life in general.

People have looked down on Mayor Duterte (yes, it's what people call him even if it's his a President now) because of his "bad" behaviors shown by the biased media. People still resent him much more when they found out that he won the election. Anyway, I'm just giving people from other countries how people think of our new president as a "bad guy" and they can't see how much Mayor Duterte has changed our country in days. Take note, in days.

Anyway, OP didn't include a source or something. I always watch the news and haven't heard of this so I think it's not true. If the real reason is because they "can't collect tax from it" then sure as hell they will ban the use of bitcoin as well. Oh well, we can easily use a VPN to access these things.

In many parts on the world gambling is banned or illegal but still people are keep gambling. In modern era of technology is also impossible for states to have full control over internet. People use Bitcoin as alternative of fiat and VPN services to by pass the states servers to have access to online gambling sites. I see this useless efforts by Philippines government.

I dont think they can block such services because there are many paid services where people can buy the services. If they want to stop online gambling, the only effective way is to block all internet service providers in their country. Of course there will be many side effects of it.

If they do not ban the gambling sites then it will be easier for everyone there to gamble as with bitcoin no one will know that you are playing gamblings or not, bitcoin is an anonymous system of payment and with that you can gamble anonymously .

Anything online who relies on the user to access a website to get a service they like cannot be banned no matter how hard the government of the Philippines try or any other government in the world. Online gambling makes no exception from this rule. As far as I know many online gambling websites are restricted in the USA but many of the online gamblers are from the USA in most of the well known gambling sites.
To bypass this restriction you can use TOR for example or even a simple VPN who will give you a different IP from a different country in which online gambling is not banned.
 

Gambling is illigal in many countrys,for example China,Spain etc,but you can use btc sites,on some of them you can even gamble without registering,if you even have to register,nobody ask your documments
Govs always want tax everyhing,so thay are geting nothing

I think you cannot stop people from spending their money where they want. If someone wants to burn his money will you stop him or can you stop him ? no then why even try to stop people from having fun with gambling.

You mean they have no casinos in Spain? I wasn't surprised to know that it is illegal in China (but isn't playing on the stock market just like gambling?  :D ) but there is a shock to me really.  :-\

I'm not from Spain but i think they call casinos by different name :)  Its a catholic country so its normal to say they don't want gambling. Same thing in the Philippines, a catholic county the priest themselves get to plat mahjong which is a game originally from China.

Gambling anyway is not good and is sure way of loosing your hard earned money. I think this is your golden chance to quit for good if you are addicted to gambling. You should not violate laws and better take it as something positive which will save you from future losses. You had chances to invest this money somewhere else.

Is it right to ban gambling?

17 votes for NO!
13 votes for YES!

I think this result show what kindof opinion people have here. And my vote is NO, I don't see a reason why would someone forbid gambling. This just shows how many crazy people live in this world. Not just crazy, stupid also. And how to fight against stupidity?
I feel sorry for you guys there, I hope this will not happen. And if its happen I hope you will find a way to continue to do what you like!

Yes, It is not good decision they must rise the awareness what bad effects gambling have and how can it ruin their life, I don't think ban can be solution of any thing because people can find the way to get the online gambling sites easily, so that my vote is also for No.

And how exactly he, or anyone else  is gonna enforce this ban on people? They will monitor whole internet, every site will be evaluated and blocked if the content resembles 'gambling' enough?
How about services where you can bet with CS:GO skins or DOTA2 skins? It is gambling or not?

They do not get tax is the actual reason and saying that we are stopping this because we do not want people to get addicted to it is stupid. They are not getting profits with gambling and they seek profit in everything, so maybe they want some profit from this.

I guess you have taken this, out of the context. I read from the news that, Government officials, especially his cabinet members are prohibited from playing online games, playing golf, and any other leisure especially on the working schedule of the government officials. I would have been better if you provided the link of this news you are trying to imply in this forum.

Note: Duterte did not say he will ban online gambling in phlippines.

The president is very spontaneous, it just come out from his mouth during a short interview and saw it myself too.
It wasn't emphasized much by the media as they are more focus to war on drugs and there are only few Filipinos who are that fond with online gambling. Solaire might just be preparing for the worse.

this is the stupidest thing i have ever heard a government do and not only about bitcoin or gambling but in general !

the second part is just plain dumb saying we don't want people to become addicted to it. and the first part about taxes may not be as dumb but it is still pretty dumb. because you can easily regulate online gambling sites and set simple rules asking them to pay taxes based on their earnings just the same way you tax offline casinos.

i dont think that it many be possible to bane gambling in Philippine or any other place. i am hearing such kind of news for such a long time but still practically there is no such action taken.

But banning a particular activity means people will fear to do so and obviously bring a huge fall in the number of users gambling online from PHILIPPINES, I think may be online casino will have to pay them some extra fees to keep up and running just to ensure not affected.

You have a nice point, but this move will still affect the numbers of online gamblers for sure, even a less percent.

I also wonder the same, how can they trace people who are gambling ONLINE ? because seriously online gambling is very anonymous and with bitcoins it gets even better. So, may be its a lame attempt from the government.

Gotta love country leaders, LOL.

I tell ya, at this point, we're better off without the grubby bastards.

yeah you gotta love him. No president has ever done it before but yeah.  He'd been killing a lot of methheads already and we love him for doing it.
Ever heard of a president warning a druglord live on TV saying the moment the druglord step on the internnatonal airport, he'd die.  kinda like an itboy.

Actually my country also banned online gambling, there are many online gambling sites blocked by our government. That's why i'm using bitcoin for gambling, they don't know about bitcoin.

That is to bad for them but lets look on the bright side they now can focus more on saving money instead spending them on gambling.
This is also going to make criminals active again because they will use this to now host illegal gambling meetings and stuff.

I saw it too, Duterte said that he want to stop the online gambling that are operating here in the Philippines. I don't think he want to tax the gambling by saying that he would stop it. He just want to completely stop the gambling for the benifit of the family of the gamblers who are addicted to it.

As per my personal opinion this is not a good decision to bad the online gambling, I don't think it could be easy for them to ban all online gambling, when bitcoin is very easy to use and people can play on them without any verification than they will convert to it.

Well, this only means good news to bitcoin, since everyone in Philippines that wants to gamble, will simply download a bitcoin wallet and start gambling in bitcoin where there is no censorship or any limits, and gobs can't do nothing about it.

well its not quite true, the government has the right to banned the gambling site including the bitcoin gambling, and in my country they have law that stated if you get caught gambling online the penalty is the same with physical gambling, bitcoin gambling will be illegal

in my opinion there are a good side if the president really want clear the country from gambling, gambling is really attempting activity, if you become addicted to it, its a very dangerous for yourself for the neighbour and the country( the crime rate will increase)

As of now, Duterte doesn't know what bitcoin is. But I think soon the Philippine government will ask the telco companies to block all online gambling sites (both fiat and crypto) if BTC is popular in the Philippines.

The only they can block are those known gambling sites but the newer might not be.
but then again the use of VPN will still be a possible solution for us. if would be a disaster if some exchange like yobit be blocked as they do have dice game. :)

Yes, Filipino users still can enjoy bitcoin gambling without the help of VPN as this was not a big deal yet right now.

So sorry to hear that, its not a good idea but hey is it will work if we use other country VPN
Iin my country also ban gambling but online gambling is not but i dont what the future i am sure it will be banned too

judging by how whacked out and right wing this guy is, i'd say that was the least of the average filipino's problems.

I think once the Mayor of the Philippines has decided on something, it is not easy to contradict or give another insights because, we got to admit online gambling is the as gambling but it is not easy to monitor. And it would be hard if BTC would really become popular in the philippines as our tax is considered to be high. I'm sure we could all understand the reasons why he would ban online gambling.

even bitcoin not so popular in Philippine but i saw that several people already use it and i think block all online gambling sites won't stop people to gambling and such as porn sites in my country even my government block them but many people still can visiting and use porn sites and will not so different too for gambling sites blocking the particular sites doesn't stop people to use it

Good luck enforcing that... Will be like making alcohol illegal  :D

its sort of like that.
 no one still can bann alcohol since its the preferred drug of all time. Gambling is addicting and preferred way to lose money as well.
It isn't a cheap entertainment  but people spend money just to gamble. And most of us do it.

My point is that governments are free to pass as many anti bitcoin laws as they want, but people will still be able to gamble because the bitcoin protocol doesn't care about government laws. If the gov in your country bans access to all gambling sites, simply get a VPN and you are gambling again, easy.

They cant do it, the technology not is just too advance to do it in a one whole country.

if gambling is not banned in Philippine then why will they banned it online. i do not think so i think these are just the false news about bitcoin and there is no reality about this.

I have watched this news.  It doesn't necessary says all online gambling.  As what I understand, they are targeting the online gambling that were built locally and that these gambling site are not regulated by PAGCOR.  So they are asking PAGCOR to investigate about this online gambling site and have it shutdown.  And if in worst case ONLINE GAMBLING is banned in the Philippines, they can't control or stop people from accessing and playing it even if they required all the TELCOs to block all gambling site. They can just use VPN.

Its more of getting tax to these online gambling sites. cock fight is the most common gambling in the country, its a huge business and they can't hide such event to the public. it has become part of the culture already so its legal and the local government can tax. Online gambling can't be monitored so they better ban it.

That's the very lame excuse to give by a responsible government for a reason for ban. I think its just a means to call a dog a bad name in other to hang it and from my position that's just it. What a reasonable government is to put in policies and machineries to reduce the extent of tax evasion in that area to increase revenue... My 2 cents...

Wow, I'm surprised at the poll results.

I don't care what the Philippines does,  honestly,  but I think it is wrong for their government to do that.  Same thing with the United States.   It's a personal freedom.   What we do with our hard earned money is our fucking business,  and gambling in and of itself isn't illegal,  so governments should stay out of regulating it to the point of banning it.

Bad news and good news. The bad news is for those who expect the extraordinary profits in gambling or those wishing to hone his abilities in the game they love, while wish benefit. The good news is this could make the pencandu gambling that wants to get out but cannot, they can take advantage of this to come out in the gambling

Filipino poker players are some of the best I have seen.  Seriously.  They pay close attention to what is happening, and they usually sense when an opponent is holding a strong hand.  And that is about 90% of what is necessary to be a winning player.  But right now, President Rodrigo Duterte is tightening the screws.

I don't think gambling will be banned entirely in the Philippines. the reason the president would like to have this banned is mainly because the government is having a hard time taxing online gambling institutions. I think they will find a way around this and not by banning it because a lot of people in the Philippines are in a way doing online gambling.

For real they are. I have seen tournaments on TV where they have won the tournament sometimes even by sensing that other players were bluffing. I enjoy watching big poker tournaments on TV and Filipinos do quite well there. With a simple VPN anyone can bypass such restrictions from the government. I don't know a lot in technology but I think online gambling is very difficult to be banned. So to all Filipinos out there don't worry you will still have access to your favorite online casino with a simple VPN.

Asians in general have always been such professional gamblers and they literary gamble on anything. and Philippines people are one of those Asians with a very long history of gambling and so many different games, i doubt that this president can make any changes now after hundreds of years of gambling history.

I think btc gambling is not covered with that law so nothing to worry about that. Those online gambling that the President saying was E-games, E-bingo, etc. So btc gambling is still safe to do atm.

I think btc gambling is covered in it. It is clearly stated that all form of online gambling must be banned because they are not paying tax to government.


Im with duterte about his decision on this law. Online casino must pay their tax. But if in case it will be banned. I think vps will bypass their security. Hahhaa.

you are really naive person, people never make big profit with gambling, it is kinda good news because people will stop wasting their time on such things

i also think the same way mate this action will only to take place with those online casino business which been operated without proper taxes so the President only wants to stop those who's taking advantage on it, so banning everything is not possible just those who's not following the government rules.

Yeah, this is the best thing to do. so the more people who have more advanced thoughts against gambling, and surely they already will have no intention to get huge profits in gambling, they just had a thought to looking for a entertainment

Well, if that's true, I think there's nothing wrong with that, I haven't seen the news yet or heard about it, but surely it will lessen those people who still have the guts to gamble even if they have nothing to eat or just wasting their time gambling instead of working...

i think that was including bitcoin gambling sites but for the gamblers who life at philippine do not be worry regarding this because many people from other countries says gambling with bitcoin is illegal but in the fact they still can do their gambling activities without any problem because gamblers will always find a way to gamble without caught by local authorities

They might be able to censor and ban online gambling with fiat but good luck banning online btc gambling  :D

Currently this wasn't yet implemented by Our President Rodrigo Duterte, It's hard to our Government to implement or detect these gamblers. For me It's good to our community to banned gamble because we people in the Philippines are too much addicted in gamble.  

If they try to ban online gambling in the philippines maybe they would  have a hard time on implementing it since internet is so vast and its not easy to ban all of those existing websites  especially to bitcoin based gambling sites  because  for sure  they dont know even about those sites i guess.

it looks like the banning part is mostly talk than anything else and i think the president is mostly looking for money to take out through taxes.

maybe he is facing some budget problems that he wants to fill and solve through takin these taxes from gamblers.

Yeah, poor countries' policy are ridiculous, like PH and China, they ban online gambling, China bans bitcoin for many times, but actually can't ban totally, it is impossible unless they cut down the internet connection.

It's not so hard for them, government has the money to hire people to do those tasks, spying on gambling sites and activities and pretending as player, and might keep an eye on those public wifi's which might come true this coming years... But since there are only few bills that covers internet, perhaps that would make their moves slow...   :)

this news is mostly about gambling in general not just online gambling so they will close down the physical casinos first and also it is not that hard to block these websites. any site that is registered in their jurisdiction will be closed down and any other site will be blocked. you can still use TOR,... but still it is harder.

Yes they can only shut down physical casino and fiat based registered casino but it will be impossible for any country to stop bitcoin casino. They dont have fear about their citizen lossing being addictive but they care more about the tax they are not getting from these casinos.

Yes I agree with it , but Bitcoin casino cannot easily get banned because its anonymous if Philippines use censorship in web its possible. PROUD TO BE A FILIPINO

Stopping physical casinos would be easy  if  the law is implemented  but not compared to stop on those online  gambling sites, yes you are right  they can easily be blocked  but people would  definitely find a way to gamble as you said  using that TOR would  be unstoppable i guess.

I have visited PH before, I have seen many real casinos there, but they don't allow online gambling? Doesn't make sense, maybe the government only cares about taxes.

Yes, as long as technologies support human to evolve, government will get problems. We should not ignore that government is not caring about people's health and wealth. I believe every government is highly responsible for it's citizen's welfare. I like to appreciate Philippines government's decision on gambling. I wish my country too to follow Philippines government's stand on gambling.

Wow, I didn't know they have casinos in Pnilippines. Then the ban looks really weird. But then again I think we have the same situation in the US: many casinos and banned online gambling. Taxes make the governments rich so yeah they care about them.

Casinos in Philippines  do exist very long time  just like in other countries. As they said the newly elect President  would ban all those casinos that he will implement and for sure it would happen maybe  they would  have a hard time  to those person  that would gamble in the internet maybe they could also stop it but it would take time.

Many asian sportsbook have licnese of PH, PH is the biggest gambling country. Even bodog has PH license, to operate their asian business.

Wow too bad for Philippin fellas. They can't actually ban crypto gambling though. As long as bitcoin wallets are online, people will find a way to gamble. They can ban websites but people will use vpn's and proxies. The thing is, they will fail.

Anyway it was source of making money for site owners not common players. I think this is your opportunity to stop gambling or get rid of this gambling habit and should be thankful to your government. Real players have land casinos where they make money. Online gambling is for small level gamblers like us. You should be happy or keep loosing money using some vpn services in gambling. You still can have access through many ways.

i personally have no idea about that, but if it is in their policy then they will banned on line gambling, but i personally do not think so because i have my cusion there in philippine and according to whom gambling is allowed there, so i thing they will allow allow online gambling.

Brick and mortar casinos have significantly higher house edges, meaning players lose there even more than in Bitcoin casinos. But there are lots of other online gambling sites that are not provably fair, so their owners are likely to cheat. Anyway, Philippines government have no right to tell people how to live their lives, today they hunt gamblers and drug addicts, tomorrow it will be opposition, bloggers and just people who happened to tell a joke about the president.

This might actually be good for bitcoin, because it will be easier to just gamble on bitcoin sites in the Philippines (it will be nearly impossible to ban those websites).

Even if the Philippine government will place some firewall or regionlocking, it's not very hard to access the gambling websites with proxies or via tor or something. And since you use bitcoin for payments, it doesn't matter where you live, easy to just gamble in secret.

Yes I agree with it If the user use Virtual Private Network (VPN in short) or others application or proxies server they can access Bitcoin Casino and gambling website so the user can start play and play again.

If theres a will, theres a way. If you really want gamble online there is always a way to do that. Use vpn when doing gambling so they cannot detect you and get arrested. But you are scared of getting caught, better stay away from online gambling. Our administration is doing fine right now. As filipino, i will follow their rule

Well its already happening now, we need to follow the laws of our country if it's illegal do not play online gambling , but if you really want to gamble there is many ways if you want, be sure that no one else will know.

Its a bad news, gambling is one of the greatest entertainment for me, but unfortunately gambling also can cause a lot of problem, so i can agree if the government want to forbid gambling, but eventhough the government forbid it, there will be alot of people use trick to be able to play online gambling

trick is not needed IMHO, since cryptos are not considered as money yet here in the Philippines, this are not yet covered by the said law and it is really hard to trace bitcoin transactions if its going to a gambling site or not

Vpn might be helpfull for that but i dont think it will be more effective but it can be block if government will take some action regarding to it. Bitcoin are quite popular in philippines and i will not surprise if they will discover some illegal liabilities regarding on bitcoin and casino its because the government knows bitcoin as illegal money. And also our wallet provider wich is coins.ph have already counter measure and disallow gambling transaction on their wallet transfer thats why some other user's experience some locking of their wallet since some of them are known gamblers. Maybe it will be the basis for government to block all vpn gambler users.

I think it is too sudden to know all of these things. If I not wrong gambling on philipines is legal to their country right? Why now after the new president election they want to ban it? Doesnt make sense to me, and it will be freat for bitcoin then because most of them will us bitcoin and price will be higher too but who know the future, if their presient knoes this, I just wondering what will they do to bitcoin then

In what I've read last time in the newspaper, it is said that it is because online gambling sites do not pay tax to the government and it is hard to find them just to make them pay.. It is not a threat to bitcoin, only to online gambling, besides it is a good action, aside from the usual problems in the Philippines that was talked about now, gambling is also one big problem...

I like how you think dude yes that is exactly the same thing that thought about. a lot of these online casinos do not have the proper permits so they are not being taxed correctly. it doesn't mean that gambling will be banned or prohibited in general :D

Yeah, Genting casino is near the airport, and there are many resort casinos in the Manila center, also other cities.

Good thing Mr. President change his mind now. He will now allow online gambling like e-games, etc but the place must be far away from church and school and of course proper tax. https://news.abs-cbn.com/video/business/08/26/16/duterte-payag-na-sa-online-gambling-pero

Well, that is a good news for Filipinos. I feel more relieved now on playing gambling sites now, but even though Duterte never heard about bitcoin yet. :P

I think this is not good news he only allow those license site to run an online gambling games and what about those not licensed one?  They will still go banned and yet players who willcaught playing will still penalize by the law,

Maybe duterte doesn't know that bitcoins are existing on thia world since he's quite old to know for this coin, its better leave it to our knowledge so bitcoins well not compromise since it was known to be an illegal money and maybe he would banned it if mr. President will notice this coin existing.

Some thought about your post:

1. As you can see we are plenty of not officially licensed bitcoin gambling sites and not one is prosecuting their owners. It sudden won't change.
2. How exactly you will caught players who are gambling on these sites? There is no real way I can think of, you have VPN after all.
3. AFAIK Bitcoin is not legal tender on Philippines so bitcoin powered casinos are not really casinos according to law.

Bitcoin was in the news lately when CNN Philippines talks about WAR on DRUGS, i think his advisors had already studied it.  -- http://cnnphilippines.com/news/2016/08/26/1.5-million-pesos-worth-of-party-drugs-seized.html  bitcoin was mentioned in this page.

Yet I don't notice some bitcoin gambling sites operating here in the Philippines though so this might not be what they are after.  We can still gamble all we want.  I do bets every weekdays like my life depend to it so lets rumble.  ;D

At least you people get some license sites to play. In future, the rest of all sites may be added. So till that day you guys play in these places and enjoy your gambling. But Bitcoin betting is not there means. It is so sad and very hard to play with real currency. Yup, this is not a that much good news for gamblers.

I can see how it will lead to Bitcoin ban and prosecution of Bitcoin owners. And of course they will take all Bitcoins to sell them and keep money for themselves, while talking about saving nation from drug addicts and gamblers. Stay safe, Philippines Bitcoiners.

Hope not. There are bitcoin services in the country to which we care to use when we cash out bitcoin and if indeed they'd get into it, we may be affected.
if the government seize them to monitor us then i guess we're doomed.

The government is very serious about drugs and those who uses btc may be closely be monitored as well. Still hope not.

It's not really right to force someone not to do something. It would be like forcing someone not to smoke, drink or doing any similar things. I appreciate it as they're trying to stop us from losing our money but... Don't force us.

gamblers can simply use VPN to bet, and i don't think btc casinos will ban ph players.

That's right, still users from Philippines should take additional measures to protect their privacy, since government is rampaging and there are big chances to get killed extrajurisdictionaly.

damn. i logged in my bet365 account, it shows my geo is banned. so ph has banned online gambling :o

Bet365 is one of the most popular FIAT sportsbooks. But have your tried any of bitcoin powered sites like: nitrogensports.eu, sportsbet.io or directbet.eu?
I would be surprised if all these sites would be banned. That would mean that Philippines recognized bitcoin as serious legal tender.

I hope that will not happen here in the Philippines, otherwise we are going to say hello to VPN. I am really annoyed to use VPN to a certain site because it's blocked in our ISP.

We should not have to worry about this issue. Especially if do just gamble only and not a owner of a gambling site. The republic of the philippines is only doing that one because duterte wanted to be fair to all. That is the main reason why government should really have to watch on bitcoin industry if they really wanted to get some taxes from it.

Well i think there's nothing can do harm with us since we are not really indulge on illegal doings online maybe they philippine government will seize those people who use bitcoin for illegal transaction and maybe it can really get little effect for bitcoin since it has been used by bad peoples for their doings(hope it will not) but as for now government are mentioning to elimante those illegal gambling casino who's operating illegal.

If this is true and it really happen then your right were doomed. I hope they will not also ban bitcoin in the future. I can see now that some politician will think that if they ban bitcoin then there will be no gambling or ilegal transaction.

Central Bank before said that they would take actions about bitcoin but i think it would not be a negative one in our part. I think they would try to put legit ways to use bitcoin in our place

When that happens that could ban gambling in the Philippines they get hard to stop it. Because has many Filipino will play using internet VPN . Consequently they can get online gambling games even if they still here in the Philippines . Because of today's technology even which side of the world if you use a vpn they do not know any place where you are

Not totally ban, president duterte is want this online gambling be approriate in the right place and pay correct tax. Because teenager play online gambling they dont have discipline to their self. I guess it is okay because it is for the good of the people specially the in children in the republic of the philippines.

They will censor our ID, and they will not serve PH guys, so it is banned already. It was ok 1 month ago.

If they are going to ban it because of tax then it is sad to see that, because their government is going to intervene in online businesses and ar unable to device a system with which they can collect tax from them. They should have to try to device a system with which they should able to collect the taxes.

Yeah they should have to be advanced and have a control on them with that they will spend only a smaller amount to make that technology but they will get a higher profit in the form of taxes from that gambling sites.

They already started this by closing e-games. But they will not be able to stop us people who are gambling using Bitcoin. We are anonymous that they will going to find it hard before they trace or stop our actions in online gambling.

Is the online gambling include gambling with bitcoin ? If not, then you are still okay because you can still gambling with bitcoins. In my country also banned gambling but i still can do it by gambling with bitcoin.

Yes even in bitcoin gambling that includes the total ban because at wherever angle you are going to look at it. Online gambling is gambling and the most used exchange site in Philippines is that they can detect where you are getting your bitcoins at all. But the only solution that is by using bitcoin mixer, they won't trace it even it came from gambling.

Even if you wont  use a mixer they wont trace you.  Total ban would be  implemented but  it would took a long time since as we all know that bitcoin transactions are anonymous and  very hard to trace where those  money came from each transaction you made. If total ban would be implemented.

Yes that's the good thing about bitcoin because of its security and anonymity. I guess that online gambling will be applied to the e-games that are now a good industry in the country.

That is what the government wants to stop. Because I have a friend that is an addicted e-gamer and now he stopped because of that total ban.

I agree, bitcoin is hard to trace, and there's no way they'd trace you that hard and waste so many resources, unless the government has something against you or you are a shady person. If those don't apply to you, I doubt you will be caught.

Honestly, I think if you deposit bitcoin to gamble and don't change your bitcoins to real money, I don't think you will have any problem at all. The government wants to ban online gambling mainly because they can't collect tax, but they can't collect tax on bitcoins anyways. I think that you would only have a problem if you played at an online casino with fiat.

Thers still no way they can track whether your bitcoin comes from gambling sites. The coins.ph don't track any of us as far as i know even when they specifically meant they bann users who are indulge with gambling sites.

Goverment decision will be the best to follow and I think your goverment are wise enough
As I know eventhough gambling being banned, you still can try to access via VPN , right

With the use of BTC everything is possible, we can still do gambling anytime we want, that is why bitcoin is widely use for gamblers because of the convenience it can give to us and no country ever can ban gambling when we are using bitcoin, there are many ways to gamble in the internet so we will not be affected.

Some of the replies is off topic. The online gambling that Pres Duterte is talking about is those online gambling operator in the Philippines under PAGCOR-related online gambling.

Those online gambling site including bitcoin gambling site outside of the operation here in the Phillipines can still freely visited by people in here. Just use other bitcoin web wallet based outside on the PH and use only local exchanger when withdrawing the funds (bitcoin) to avoid some problems in local exchangers term.

Exactly, that is why my friend who is always playing e-games stopped already because that is considered as online gambling here in country.

Because that is making the big casino's that are paying big taxes a competition and getting their customers instead that those people are going to play to their establishment.

But still Duterte is allowing gambling in the Philippines, only physical.

It was already admitted by the new PAGCOR chairman that they cannot stop online gambling especially those like sports betting because they know that it is rampant in the country and they have an idea they cannot stop since the gambling site is not operating in the Philippines.

It was the Egames that is going to be ban in your country people but the online gambling where we are using bitcoin will never be ban. Bitcoin is anonymous so how can they do that.

That's really unfortunate. Well, the way they reasoned out is somewhat valid in their perspective because indeed they really can't simply put tax on them if they don't know where to find them.

Well, with that said, I guess bitcoin users can still gamble on bitcoin-related sites that aren't based in the philippines so I don't think it's that much of a problem because I know most of the big bitcoin gambling sites are based either in America or Europe.

You're freaking spreading a misinformation, dude. The "online gambling" that he's talking about is the "E-BINGO" and other "LINKED" games like that, not necessarily "online gambling" that we know which involves bitcoin and other altcoins (which, the Philippines clearly has nothing to say when it comes to written laws). The government can tax those, but in bitcoins and other cryptocurrency? We don't have written laws in regards to that.

Is there any source where the proof is given that your government is going to ban gambling because of unable to collect tax? I think it is not the reason and the only reason is that the government do not want their citizens to become addicts of gambling and as it is a poor country so they do not want that their money go to outside of the country because of the lose from their citizens at online gambling sites.

Is this move even possible ??? unless the government says they will ban the use of the Internet.....then the might get the ban in full effect

Yeah, they can access to gambling sites via VPN etc and can do the payment with bitcoin, so one will know that it the the people of Philippine who are playing, but they will find their success only if they follow the rules by their leaders, with that none of the nation get the success.

I think it will not become problem during using bitcoin doesn't be banned because we can stay play gambling with bitcoin as betting, although using bitcoin be banned. We still can use vpn and tor.

This is limited only to those who are into online casino business, like a computer shop but instead of renting the computer, you are there to play. This will not affect online casino games that we have here unless the President will instruct telco's to block those kind of sites all over the country so no one can open it.

Bitcoin online gambling cannot be ban because bitcoin are not regulated so we are free to gamble anytime we want. Do not worry guys, the happiness will continue.

Setting a limit in gambling is absolutely necessary to prolong your gambling experience. You can if you want use this https://apkvpk.com/crypto-coin-tracker-apk-download/ Its the update so you don't have to download (https://apkvpk.com/coinbase-buy-bitcoin-more-secure-wallet-apk-download-5-0-5-android-4-1-2/) it. It might ask for additional update but smaller then before.

Think of it, they also cannot collect tax from using bitcoin. The matter is that maybe the government don’t want us to become addicted in gambling, there are already many casinos in Philippines and they don’t want to increase it anymore through online.

I don't think there is a mere possibility that this could happen, people mainly uses gambling not only for their own basic needs or wants, it also plays a big part in the economy, and if online gambling will be banned, then I think the Philippines will be having big problems here, especially for a third world country, gambling plays a big part whether it is online or not, bitcoin or fiat, it is still heavily relied on.

I think people could still be able to use crypto casinos using VPN. This is indeed a sad news for gamblers from philippines. Most of the casinos has large number of players from Philippines. In my country (India), gambling is illegal but, you can see many people are still gamble on online casinos.

Indeed people may use VPN but bear in mind that not all online gambling sites are allowing their players to use VPN. Once it is banned in your country, it is better to avoid it or try to find gambling sites that allows you to use VPN in case you really want to gamble. There is also a risk by using VPN especially free VPN as we can be suspected as multi accounts users if there are other people using the same free VPN/IP. We cant deny that most online gambling sites are very strict in this situation especially about multi accounts. So always be careful if you are going to use VPN.

This thread was two years old already, why you keep on bumping it. This has been discussed and if ever you want to continue this discussion it's pointless, IMHO.

That's right. I had this situation when I was using VPN. Admins thought I was using alt accounts and banned me from participating in promotional contests. When I asked for the reason they gave me the name of another account which had the same IP. Luckily, she was a popular player on that website and she used to stream on twitch and Admins removed the ban after one moderator vouch for her.

Well, at least it's interesting to note that despite Rodrigo Duterte's intentions to halt all online gambling in his country, online gambling is thriving in Philippines, two years later from the OP. I don't know anything about fairness of their online casinos, but there are many of them there, that's for sure. You can find out more from the links below:

https://toponlinecasino.com.ph/

https://www.legalonlinecasinos.ph/

I think they've figured out how to tax the business for the benefit of the country.

The main issue here on plans of banning online gambling has no linkage towards personal intentions. But the most certain about online gambling operators was, they don't paid regular taxes compared with physical gambling establishments. That's why the president was really angry about the previous adminstration's negligence on tax regulations for online gambling operations in the country. If it can be arranged thoroughly with the countries leaders, huge tax collections will be handed over for the country revenue; so no banning will happen unless these operators will comply what's need by the law regulations.

I also do not think that it is so easy to happen, as  online gambling is still not banned in such countries where gambling is already an illegal activities then how can it be possible in Philippine I do not think that they can become succeeded in banning online gambling.

While the Philippine Government issued a statement a few years ago that there will be a crackdown on online games and illegal online games, we still see online games in every city here in the Philippines. I don't think this will happen. They also need the cooperation of the telecommunications company to pull this off, one of the major internet provider in the Philippines claims that they will not allow access of porn sites like Pornhub but until today, we can still access the site with out using vpn.

President Rodrigo Duterte is a guy ( as i understand it, i can be wrong )  who want to protect his people form drugs, gaming and all other things that can make more problem in his country, the people in Philippine are already very poor ( majority of them )  so it make sense. However i believe it should be up to the people to decide what to do, but in this special case, i can understand it a bit.