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Betfair in trouble for 'encouraging' underage gambling

Betfair love promoting their young sponsored poker stars - the only problem is, when one of them has an online handle of 'Annette_15', it's very easy to look upon her as being underage, or at least the company is encouraging underage gambling.

Betting ad banned for encouraging underage gambling

Seriously, you'd thought someone would have been able to figure that one out in-house without needing to be embarrassed by it. The username is a giveaway and she doesn't exactly look 30 in that photo. Drop the reference to the username and the ad is probably fine. It can always be referenced elsewhere on the site, rather than in the part answerable to strict advertising standards.

The story goes that soon-to-be 21yo Annette Obrestad, winner of the World Series of Poker Europe 2007, when she had just turned 19, began playing poker online when she was just 15 - not at Betfair I care to add. She played only play for fun events (which still should have been prohibited as a minor), but was so good at it, she never had to make a deposit and was eventually able to cash a sizeable sum onto real money sites when she was old enough to play for money.

It was when she got down to the final table at WSOPE 2007 that Betfair stepped in and signed her up as a sponsored player. Due to American law, it will be another two years before she can head to Las Vegas for the regular World Series of Poker.

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