The OLG Pushes Towards Online Casino Gaming

May 13, 2014

The Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation, also known as the OLG for short, was created back in 2000 to oversee all gaming operations that are ran inside of Ontario, Canada. There are several parts to the OLG including sections that govern lottery games, land-based casinos, slots at places like racetracks, electronic bingo games, and more. One big move that people have been waiting on is a move to the online gambling space after they announced the move to the Internet back in late 2010. How they're rolling this out is pretty important to people who are in Canada or other jurisdictions where online gambling is just started to be actively regulated by national and local governments.

Let's be certain about one thing: The OLG isn't exactly breaking new ground in Canada. The Atlantic Lottery Corporation, Loto-Quebec, and the British Columbia Lottery Corporation all have online gambling services that they run for players in their jurisdictions. The online efforts for the OLG are looking to be right up there with what these other governing bodies have to offer, and they are hoping that this expansion will help to increase their revenues while providing players with a safe and secure environment to gamble online.

Increasing revenue is a pretty big deal. The proceeds from the games that the OLG operates goes towards government-funded programs for education, health care, and other services. In short, they need these funds to operate. They're in a situation right now where players are choosing online gambling sites outside of their jurisdiction, and this means that the revenues are going somewhere else instead of into their government programs. This is the main driving force behind getting the OLG involved in providing online gambling services, and it's a common force for government bodies who are looking to get into the online side of the business.

Regulation on the national and local level has a lot of advantages for the players if it's done correctly. First off, players are made more safe and secure since rogue operators aren't allowed to run games inside of their jurisdiction. The licensing processes are stricter than average since some unregulated sites can just get “rubber stamp” style licenses that don't really hold much weight. With OLG oversight, the operators that offer services to players will be vetted and they will be sure to follow all of the regulations that are set forth to protect the players and the integrity of the games.