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France has blocked Polymarket since the World Cup in June. This was requested by the state gaming license authority, which sanction the betting business in Fra

by gabaix 12d ago

France has blocked Polymarket since the World Cup in June. This was requested by the state gaming license authority, which sanction the betting business in France. Most of the business benefits the “Federation française des jeux”, the state gaming company. Officially this was done out of concern for the safety of the French citizens.

TheRoque 11d ago
I mean... Righfully so. All those new "gambling" websites (who aren't even regulated as such) are an insider trader's dream.
- judge2020 11d ago
  A lot of trust in the government to only ban websites which are actively unhealthy for citizens and not websites which are critical or unfavorable to said government. I do wonder, was Polymarket given a chance to prevent itself from being accessed/used from Spain? They seem to be a-okay with blocking usage from US states that have asked them to cease operation, so I don't see why they would try to actively defy countries that have (legally) asked them to not do business there?
  - lemmetellya 11d ago
    This isn't a slippery slope. They ban gambling. Polymarket is gambling. It gets banned.
bigbaguette 12d ago
Gambling is quite regulated in France, it’s not new.
saulapremium 11d ago
>Officially this was done out of concern for the safety of the French citizens. Gambling regulations exist in most places in the world, including the US. With good reason.
- petcat 11d ago
  The US doesn't block websites. Occasionally the FBI will seize a domain after a court order, but that's it. French people were already forbidden from transacting on Polymarket and Kalshi, and the services themselves were forbidden to take any market orders. Nobody disagrees with the regulations. But apparently the French government still thought it was so dangerous that they needed to block the websites completely to protect the French people from themselves. This is where the line is crossed. There wasn't even a court involved at all. This happens all over Europe. The citizens give their governments the power to block things, or mass surveillance in the name of "safety" and then they just take everything and EU citizens are left wondering why.
  - prmoustache 11d ago
    I don't rank "illegal" website blockage nearly in the same category as state surveillance.
  - mitxela 11d ago
    The US already blocked Polymarket long ago and replaced it with a neutered US version. They know everyone uses VPNs to get around this, so they're trying to force the US version to be the only worldwide version.
    - petcat 11d ago
      It was just a regulatory block, not an ISP-level government block which is what we're talking about here.
      - mitxela 11d ago
        Because they didn't have to do an ISP block. If they had to, they would have.
        petcat 11d ago
        No they wouldn't have, because that's illegal in the US.
lou1306 11d ago
Entirely different situation. Polymarket is a gambling website and is subject to regulation. In Italy and (I think) Spain, they may shut down connections to a Google Cloud or AWS server _at the IP level_ if they have a _suspect_ it's hosting an illegal streaming service. This may effectively black out entirely legitimate Web sites with _no_ correlation to sports.
deleted 11d ago
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by gabaix 12d ago

TheRoque 11d ago

I mean... Righfully so. All those new "gambling" websites (who aren't even regulated as such) are an insider trader's dream.

judge2020 11d ago
A lot of trust in the government to only ban websites which are actively unhealthy for citizens and not websites which are critical or unfavorable to said government. I do wonder, was Polymarket given a chance to prevent itself from being accessed/used from Spain? They seem to be a-okay with blocking usage from US states that have asked them to cease operation, so I don't see why they would try to actively defy countries that have (legally) asked them to not do business there?
- lemmetellya 11d ago
  This isn't a slippery slope. They ban gambling. Polymarket is gambling. It gets banned.

bigbaguette 12d ago

Gambling is quite regulated in France, it’s not new.

saulapremium 11d ago

>Officially this was done out of concern for the safety of the French citizens. Gambling regulations exist in most places in the world, including the US. With good reason.

petcat 11d ago
The US doesn't block websites. Occasionally the FBI will seize a domain after a court order, but that's it. French people were already forbidden from transacting on Polymarket and Kalshi, and the services themselves were forbidden to take any market orders. Nobody disagrees with the regulations. But apparently the French government still thought it was so dangerous that they needed to block the websites completely to protect the French people from themselves. This is where the line is crossed. There wasn't even a court involved at all. This happens all over Europe. The citizens give their governments the power to block things, or mass surveillance in the name of "safety" and then they just take everything and EU citizens are left wondering why.
- prmoustache 11d ago
  I don't rank "illegal" website blockage nearly in the same category as state surveillance.
- mitxela 11d ago
  The US already blocked Polymarket long ago and replaced it with a neutered US version. They know everyone uses VPNs to get around this, so they're trying to force the US version to be the only worldwide version.
  - petcat 11d ago
    It was just a regulatory block, not an ISP-level government block which is what we're talking about here.
    - mitxela 11d ago
      Because they didn't have to do an ISP block. If they had to, they would have.
      - petcat 11d ago
        No they wouldn't have, because that's illegal in the US.

lou1306 11d ago

Entirely different situation. Polymarket is a gambling website and is subject to regulation. In Italy and (I think) Spain, they may shut down connections to a Google Cloud or AWS server _at the IP level_ if they have a _suspect_ it's hosting an illegal streaming service. This may effectively black out entirely legitimate Web sites with _no_ correlation to sports.

deleted 11d ago

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