Lottery online is the practice of buying lottery tickets through Internet sites, often for a premium on the base ticket price. Online lottery-style games are growing in popularity, especially with the proliferation of mobile devices. According to GTech Corporation, based in West Greenwich, Rhode Island, it administers 70% of the worldwide online and instant lottery business.
The first commercial Internet lottery was launched in 1995 by the International Lottery Foundation (ILLF) in Liechtenstein, a country with no state-run lottery. ILLF pioneered Internet gaming and is responsible for the development of instant lottery games. Today, it operates several websites, referred to as the ILLF brands, including PLUS Lotto, which is available in many countries. The ILLF also supports charitable projects domestically and internationally.
Until 1967, it was illegal in Canada to buy lottery tickets. That year, however, the federal Liberal government introduced a special law called an Omnibus Bill that sought to bring up-to-date a number of obsolete laws. The Bill included an amendment to the Criminal Code making it legal for a provincial or territorial government to operate a lottery system.
After the law was passed, several Canadian provinces and territories established lotteries. Today, Canada has four nationwide lotteries: Lotto 6/49, Lotto Max, Daily Grand and Millionaire Life. The lottery commissions are overseen by the Interprovincial Lottery Corporation, a consortium of five regional lotteries owned by their respective provincial and territorial governments: Atlantic Lottery Corporation (New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador), Loto-Quebec (Quebec), Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (Ontario), Western Canada Lottery Corporation (Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta) and Quebecor Inc.
While the ILTF was originally set up to support charitable projects, it now includes a commercial division that generates revenue through online gaming. The ILTF also offers a lottery-style game known as Instant Millionaire, which pays out small prizes of up to $100,000 every three months to players from around the world.
In Laos, the government is trying to crack down on rigged lottery results. The country’s prime minister recently sent a directive requiring the Ministry of Finance to work with the Ministry of Public Security to reduce informal football and lottery draws, as well as lottery chances sold through short messaging services, RFA’s Lao Service reports. The government is also seeking to limit the number of drawings each week and improve the transparency of the drawing process. The new rules will also seek to reduce the size of prize money for winning entries. The government hopes to implement the changes in early 2017. This story was reported by Ounkeo Souksavanh and translated by Richard Finney.