North America’s First Authorized Online Casino still down after “Data Crossover Malfunction”

The just-launched online casino of the British Columbia Lottery Corporation (BCLC), the first government-approved Internet gambling website in North America which represented a change in Canadian gambling laws, had serious problems in its first week. The result was over 100 user accounts compromised and the subsequent shutdown of the website altogether. 

Thanks to a security breach, some 134 user accounts were violated and 12 cases of players having access to other players’ personal information were reported. About CA$8,000 ($7,720) of funds were used by other players before the Canadian Internet casino site was closed. 

Though the breach and subsequent problems happened last Friday, BCLC officials only disclosed the information yesterday. BCLC CEO Michael Graydon stated that this was due to the fact that “Our first priority was really to our players and making sure we got to them first. We wanted to make sure that they heard from BCLC and not read it in the newspaper.” 

In fact, BCLC officials on Friday used “high player volumes” as an excuse for the emergency shutdown of the gambling website. A “data crossover malfunction” was yesterday given as reason for the problems.  

The website, PlayNow.com, is still offline as of this writing with no announcement of its relaunch forthcoming.