CHENNAI: The state government on Monday told the Madras High Court that online gaming companies to entice the players by offering incentives in order to make profits and there is the possibility of bots participating in the games by disguising them as real players.
“There is no firm way of verifying age of player, except a self-declaration in that regard, the role of artificial intelligence (AI) and the use of patterns of behaviours of players gathered through AI over a period of time, utter lack of transparency, the inability of players to communicate with each other, and the possibility of bots participating as players in the game, apart from the fact that the businesses primary consideration is to entice the players to play as often as possible, in order that the organisers (gaming firms) can make larger profits,” said senior counsel Kapil Sibal, appearing for the state government in the case against Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Online Gambling and Regulation of Online Gaming Act.
He made the submissions before the first bench of Chief Justice SV Gangapurwala and Justice PD Audikesavalu. Saying that easy access to the games will affect the player’s health leading to addiction, Sibal said the design of the online game is such that it induces the players by providing them bonuses, he said. “The online gaming house’s main objective is to induce the players as frequently as possible to play rummy or poker for stakes with the intent to garner larger profits. Such motive would be absent in Clubhouse even though the Clubhouse may have considerations of revenue earning.”
Noting that the online gaming companies earn a huge profit every year, the senior counsel told the bench their profits would suffer a marginal dip only because of the ban imposed in the state as the Act bans gambling only in the state and not elsewhere.
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