130,000 Australians are playing illegal internet poker games

Nearly 130,000 Australians are playing illegal internet poker games, with United States operators raking in $68 million in one year, according to new research.

Online casino games, including poker, are currently illegal in Australia. But in May the federal government released an interim review of interactive gaming laws that recommended legalising internet poker games, as part of overall liberalising of industry.

Other casino games would remain banned and poker would be trialled over several years.

Despite being illegal foreign-based websites offering poker are freely available to Australian punters. In a submission to the review, German research group Academicon said, in 2010, 129,714 Australians played online poker, with US operators taking $68 million.

Ingo Fiedler, of the University of Hamburg, which has an online poker database, said 36,000 people in NSW were playing, with 31,915 in Victoria. Dr Fiedler said the 2010 figures were the most recent available.

''Our advice is based on academic research and objective data. A key advantage is that we do not have a stake in the gambling industry,'' he said.

''Most industry reports on internet gambling [grossly] overestimates its prevalence and market size due to lobbying reasons.''

A productivity commission investigation in 2010 estimated that up to $800 million could be spent on online gambling with $249 million on online poker alone. It also said there were 363,100 poker accounts active in Australia in 2008.

Dr Fiedler said the majority of punters played only occasionally, for small amounts, for just a short while and at only one table.

''If people get addicted to slot machines [pokies] they are more likely to play online poker, and the other way around.''

The opposition and independent Senator Nick Xenophon have both publicly denounced the push to liberalise online gambling.

Monash University Public Health expert Charles Livingstone said the figures were unsurprising but suggested it was likely the figure was on the low side of current use.

''In any event, the data held by the University of Hamburg's database is undoubtedly useful, but probably not as a source of overall prevalence or expenditure figures,'' Dr Livingstone said.

He said available research for online poker suggests that many online poker players played for relatively small takes and tend to win or lose only modestly. Around $12 billion is estimated to be spent on pokies every year.

''Liberalisation of online gambling is feasible and should start as the PC suggested with liberalisation of online poker, but not before serious and nationally consistent harm minimisation measures are properly regulated by the federal government, not the states,'' Dr Livingstone said.

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