Not Listed but Still Banned, Who’s at Fault?

[Russlenat]

Imagine you’re a gambler from a country where gambling is totally banned, offline and online. You look for an offshore casino, check the restricted countries list, and your country isn’t there. You sign up, deposit, gamble, maybe even win.

Then one day, the casino suddenly bans your account, saying gambling is illegal in your country.

So who’s really at fault here?

The gambler checked the rules and wasn’t listed as restricted. The casino allowed registration, deposits, and betting without any issue. If access was not allowed, why wasn’t the country blocked from the start?

On the other hand, casinos always say it’s the player’s responsibility to know local laws. Fair enough, but then what’s the point of publishing a restricted countries list if it can be ignored anytime?

Should the casino at least allow withdrawal of funds before closing the account, or is confiscation justified?

Interested to hear your thoughts about this scenario.

[crwth]

So who’s really at fault here?

I believe it's going to be both. Even if there is no listing in the site, they can change it without warning and adjust accordingly. Maybe they have an update on the legality of a specific country, and then it's mostly the players to blame, but there should be some leeway to help the player, given the casino's lack of transparency.

On the other hand, casinos always say it’s the player’s responsibility to know local laws. Fair enough, but then what’s the point of publishing a restricted countries list if it can be ignored anytime?

Should the casino at least allow withdrawal of funds before closing the account, or is confiscation justified?

Interested to hear your thoughts about this scenario.

I believe that there should be at least some kind of help from the casino, just because it should've been there and part of the country's list.

Maybe some filtering was already done when registering on the site. There are locations to be chosen, right? Maybe there should be a deterrent already at that step.

[Pandu Geddon]

I haven't seen a case like that. I also live in a country that prohibits gambling. But I can still gamble at crypto casinos or illegal sites. 
I once came across a crypto casino that blocked me from registering; that was at the beginning, when I wanted to access it, and they provided information that their site could not be accessed from my country. That's better than the case you mentioned. 
Casinos will block registration from the start for countries they have already recorded in their system. But for countries that haven't included in the system, customers need to double-check. You can ask through support; that will be safer before making a deposit.

[CryptoYar]

This situation is classic illegal market nightmare, which has become huge argument when world gambling law becomes much more strict. You have brought up huge issue of outside casinos having kind of hidden filter that allows you to freely sign up and lose money but then real one of take all rule to cross out and keep your money in case you try to take it out.

Current ways in gaming law in 2025 and 2026 are beginning to hold casinos more responsible, with law makers talking about habit to check ID when you win game as unfair checking. I think that although player is supposed to know his or her laws, casino is fairly wrong in its action of taking money using technology and not using same technology to block countries that are not allowed. So casino must at least give back your first money unless there is crime like money hiding and not steal it in name of being law abiding citizen. So use guide to safe casinos to find out what permits really work in your interest and force site to pay back your money in case your account is shut down.

[mirakal]

We don’t really stand a chance here. If a casino allows you to gamble, then fine, but we shouldn’t think it’s our right to demand anything. In the first place, we already know gambling is illegal, we’re just finding some kind of temporary shelter to play.

So if they suddenly do something like withholding winnings, we can’t really fight it legally, because what we’re doing is illegal to begin with. The casino might get questioned about its reputation for allowing you to gamble and then banning you later, but at the end of the day, it feels like you just fell into their trap.

[Pi-network314159]

Imagine you’re a gambler from a country where gambling is totally banned, offline and online. You look for an offshore casino, check the restricted countries list, and your country isn’t there. You sign up, deposit, gamble, maybe even win.

Then one day, the casino suddenly bans your account, saying gambling is illegal in your country.

So who’s really at fault here?

it is the fault of the casino and not the gambler because at the initial time of registration, there where no laws but the law became effective after his sign-up and probably win, so its entirely the fault of the casino and not the gambler.

Fair enough, but then what’s the point of publishing a restricted countries list if it can be ignored anytime?

there is no point in publishing a restricted country when it can be ignored anytime. but i think the country in question was out of the map, but perhaps it was restricted because of the law given to that country. but the casino would have allowed the customer to withdraw his fund and restrict the account immediately after that withdrawal and not in the absent of withdrawal.

Should the casino at least allow withdrawal of funds before closing the account, or is confiscation justified?

like i said they would have allowed the withdrawal before restriction.

[Questat]

It could be a fault on the casino’s side, but that alone isn’t enough to accuse them of scamming. Normally, casinos only list countries where gambling is regulated. Depending on those regulations, if they don’t have the proper license to accept players from a certain country, they’ll block it.

For countries where gambling is already obviously illegal from the start, they might choose not to list them at all, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s still illegal. If we blame the casino while already knowing gambling is illegal in our own country, then we’ve already failed the “responsible gambling” argument ourselves.

[bitbollo]

I know very well a friend of mine that has the exact same issue with a "big" name of this industry.
This is why all ToS are designed to protect the casinos and not the players... if you see clearly what there is inside, you will find tons of commas and points that clearly protect their business.
Now I am sorry for the issue. You cannot do literally nothing... Lawyers would just waste time and money (and you are still "illegal").
In any case most of the courts are based in remote areas with a huge expenses. they can just deny everything due their Rules....

[FinneysTrueVision]

Casinos can’t possibly know the laws of every country on Earth, so they include that special provision about following local laws. What I don’t like is how this is enforced selectively sometimes. For example, they might not say that a country’s residents aren’t allowed to play, but then suddenly somebody gets a big win and they suddenly become aware that gambling was illegal in the country they’ve been accepting players from for a long time.

The burden of responsibility should be on casinos to know where they are allowed to operate. Japan is one of those countries where online gambling is illegal; however, you rarely see them mentioned as a prohibited country. That gives Japanese players the impression they are allowed to play, but there is always a risk that they could lose their money based on a technicality.

[gunhell16]

Imagine you’re a gambler from a country where gambling is totally banned, offline and online. You look for an offshore casino, check the restricted countries list, and your country isn’t there. You sign up, deposit, gamble, maybe even win.

Then one day, the casino suddenly bans your account, saying gambling is illegal in your country.

So who’s really at fault here?

The gambler checked the rules and wasn’t listed as restricted. The casino allowed registration, deposits, and betting without any issue. If access was not allowed, why wasn’t the country blocked from the start?

On the other hand, casinos always say it’s the player’s responsibility to know local laws. Fair enough, but then what’s the point of publishing a restricted countries list if it can be ignored anytime?

Should the casino at least allow withdrawal of funds before closing the account, or is confiscation justified?

Interested to hear your thoughts about this scenario.

I experienced a scenario where my country was initially not restricted, allowing me to create an account and deposit funds. However, when I attempted to log in recently, I was suddenly blocked because the casino is no longer available in my region.

When I raised this concern with their support team, they simply stated that my country is now restricted. When I asked about my deposited funds, they claimed they could no longer return them due to the restriction. This is completely unacceptable because the policy change happened after my deposit, and as a player, I should have been given the chance to withdraw my balance.

[Oasisman]

Interested to hear your thoughts about this scenario.

In this case, the fact that the casino accepted the deposit and the player was able to play, I think the casino owes an explanation about why they suddenly banned the account after learning that the player resides in a country that treats gambling as illegal. In this scenario, I think the law only applies within its local jurisdiction, and an offshore casino doesn't have anything to do with that. There's no VPN involved or any program that can bypass country restrictions, right? So, yeah, definitely this one's on the casino, and the player needs an explanation, a full refund of what's left on his account, and then close the account and move on.
They did not even send a warning. IMO, the confiscation is NOT justified. They are taking advantage of some unwritten law on their end without sending any warning. This usually happens when a player makes a huge win, some crooked casinos will find something they can go against you to deny withdrawal. So, it's always wise to choose the most reputable casinos, taking some risks on shady ones, even if you're out of options, is not worth it.
 

[viljy]

If the casino has a license, then the licensing terms may have restrictions for certain countries, hence the list of prohibited countries. Countries where gambling is prohibited may not be on this list, and then the responsibility for complying with local laws lies with the client (this should be indicated in the text of the TOS). Moreover, the TOS can be changed unilaterally, and continued use of casino services means acceptance of this. Similarly, the casino can block the client at any time if he does not comply with the law of his country (on the prohibition of gambling), that is, violates the TOS (where this duty is assigned to him). So legally, everything looks legal...

[Mr. Magkaisa]

It is your fault to gamble because you are banned from doing that as a citizen of that country that banned gambling for its people.
It is a short from the casino not to list your country on the banned list, Well just to be clear, Casino should list the country  that can play on hteir platform and not the banned countries.

What ever it is, you dont have any chance to win against the casino, where you can sue them? Your country will not tolerate you also!

[julerz12]

Well, for one, if it is already banned in your own country (assuming you already know this) and you still explicitly signed up and used the casino, that is your own responsibility. The moment you signed up, you already accepted the risk of getting banned when eventually that casino finds out your country doesn't allow gambling. Some users knowingly do this, and some even use a VPN just to use a specific casino.

As for the deposits/withdrawals concerns, voiding just the winnings would certainly leave a bad taste.
So, I think, the casino should just void all the bets, the winnings, and the losses, then return the user's initial deposit once the ban has been enforced, or at least allow them to withdraw it.

[Betwrong]

Imagine you’re a gambler from a country where gambling is totally banned, offline and online. You look for an offshore casino, check the restricted countries list, and your country isn’t there. You sign up, deposit, gamble, maybe even win.

Then one day, the casino suddenly bans your account, saying gambling is illegal in your country.

So who’s really at fault here?

The gambler checked the rules and wasn’t listed as restricted. The casino allowed registration, deposits, and betting without any issue. If access was not allowed, why wasn’t the country blocked from the start?

On the other hand, casinos always say it’s the player’s responsibility to know local laws. Fair enough, but then what’s the point of publishing a restricted countries list if it can be ignored anytime?

Should the casino at least allow withdrawal of funds before closing the account, or is confiscation justified?

Interested to hear your thoughts about this scenario.

Absolutely. That's the first thing they should do - write to you about how to withdraw your money from their platform. No confiscation can be justified and if if they do it, it's theft. It's there responsibility to include you in the list of banned countries and to not allow you to deposit your money on their platform.

[casey15]

As long as you are aware of the ban in your country, going ahead to gamble is you breaking the law. The casino is t at fault, you are.
They may not have discovered depending on how popular your country is and how the government works,  if gambling is really banned, you won't be able to access such website except you make use of a VPN and the casino wouldn't be aware of the country you are playing from except when you have been requested to do KYC and submit some documents.
You as a citizen of a country should be able to uphold the laws and so you will be held responsible. If the casino do not restrict your account, they are bound to face lawsuit. On the other hand, the casino should do better but remember that some casino may be US based only but people access them from other part of the world using VPNs.

[Agbamoni]

As long as you are aware of the ban in your country, going ahead to gamble is you breaking the law. The casino is t at fault, you are.
They may not have discovered depending on how popular your country is and how the government works,  if gambling is really banned, you won't be able to access such website except you make use of a VPN and the casino wouldn't be aware of the country you are playing from except when you have been requested to do KYC and submit some documents.
You as a citizen of a country should be able to uphold the laws and so you will be held responsible. If the casino do not restrict your account, they are bound to face lawsuit. On the other hand, the casino should do better but remember that some casino may be US based only but people access them from other part of the world using VPNs.

I wont blame the gambler because, according to OP, he checked if there are restrictions on his contry which there isnt. He made it clear that the casino list did not include his country as part of the restricted countries.

However, that does not affect the casino in any way. The gambler will be blamed for not making further inquiries about the casino. These days, I dont read the rules or the Tos alone. I do ask questions from gamblers who have played with the casino to know if what the casino says in their rules are through or not.

[Zlantann]

Should the casino at least allow withdrawal of funds before closing the account, or is confiscation justified?

Interested to hear your thoughts about this scenario.

Gamblers always bear the brunt of any mistake, even when it should be a shared one. This is why it is ideal for gamblers not to intentionally disobey country laws or casino terms of service. I will blame the gambler for violating the laws of his country. Not listing his country might be an oversight, and his ability to sign up might be called a technical problem.

However, the casino also aided the gamblers in violating the country's law. Countries where gambling is restricted should not have access to the casino. For this reason, they should also suffer some consequences. The entire funds shouldn't be confiscated; they should be able to give the gambler all or a reasonable part of the win.   

[Don Pedro Dinero]

Imagine you’re a gambler from a country where gambling is totally banned, offline and online. You look for an offshore casino, check the restricted countries list, and your country isn’t there. You sign up, deposit, gamble, maybe even win.

Then one day, the casino suddenly bans your account, saying gambling is illegal in your country.

So who’s really at fault here?

That is why, after the list of banned countries, casinos often include a clause saying something like ‘and any other country where it is not legal to play at the casino’. Another formula I have seen is, before starting the list, to say ‘including but not limited to...’.

It is a way of protecting themselves.

If the casino contains a clause of that kind, the gambler is clearly at fault.

[_act_]

Should the casino at least allow withdrawal of funds before closing the account, or is confiscation justified?

This happened to you or it happened to someone that you know?

Or you just think about it and ask the question here on this forum?

I think it would be better for this kind of thing to happen first or cite an example of who it happened to before we can turn it to a good discussion.

This has not happened to me before and I have not heard of anyone that it has happened to before.

Before that gambling sites are banned this way are people that use VPN to access the gambling site because of geolocation restriction in their country from the gambling site.