Black Friday (2011) and the Poker Indictments

**Black Friday (April 15, 2011)** refers to the unsealing of federal indictments against the three largest online poker operators in the United States: **PokerStars**, **Full Tilt Poker**, and **Absolute Poker**. The Department of Justice (SDNY) seized their domains and charged their founders with bank fraud, money laundering, and illegal gambling offenses under the **UIGEA of 2006**. **Key Technical Aspects:** * **Transaction Laundering:** Operators used third-party processors to miscode gambling deposits as retail purchases (e.g., flowers, pet supplies) to bypass banking blocks. * **Full Tilt Insolvency:** The investigation revealed Full Tilt was operating a **Ponzi scheme**, crediting player accounts with "phantom funds" that were never actually collected from banks, resulting in a $300M+ shortfall. * **Regulatory Pivot:** The event triggered a 2011 DOJ opinion clarifying that the **Wire Act** applied *only* to sports betting. This paradoxically paved the way for state-regulated iGaming and the eventual rise of **Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS)** to fill the digital gaming void.