A lawsuit has been filed against Valve for allowing a "illegal online gambling market" to grow and flourish within the massively popular game Counter Strike: Global Offensive.
According to the lawsuit, Valve has "knowingly allowed … and has been complicit in creating, sustaining and facilitating [a] market" where third parties trade weapons and skins just like casino chips in a real casino.
The lawsuit, which can be found in it's entirety filled with juridical and legal terms and mumbo jumbo at Polygon, boils down to Valve allowing, supporting, and profiting from what the suit claims to be illegal online gambling. The skins for various weapons in CS:GO can be traded and sold for real money and are used as casino chips by third party websites which Valve let's players link their accounts to, making betting easier.
The online betting isn't just a small business, Bloomberg described it as a $2.3 billion business for everyone involved, including Valve. Besides Valve allowing the gambling to flourish the gambling sites often don't have any age control, meaning that under aged kids can partake in the gambling, an activity which is illegal to partake in unless the participant is above a certain age (mostly between ages 18 -21). The lawsuit does not save on fancy words when describing what Valve is doing.
"Valve owns the league, sells the casino chips, and receives a piece of the casino’s income stream through foreign websites in order to maintain the charade that Valve is not promoting and profiting from online gambling, like a modern-day Captain Renault from Casablanca"
The lawsuit was filed by Connecticut resident Michael John McLeod who himself claims to have gambled both as a youngster and an adult and lost money via the skin trade/ gambling. McLeod and his lawyer is looking for a class action lawsuit against Valve. If the lawsuit goes through then the bill for Valve might be more than they can swallow.
This is the second time Valve has had legal problem in recent times, a few months ago Valve was found guilty of breaking Australian law.
