Britain's culture secretary on Friday compared the United States crackdown on online gambling to the failed alcohol ban of the Prohibition as she prepared to host an international summit on Internet gambling next week.

Tessa Jowell warned that the U.S. ban on Internet gambling would make unregulated offshore sites the "modern equivalent of speakeasies," illegal bars that opened in 1920s America when alcohol was banned.

U.S. Congress caught the gambling industry by surprise earlier this month when it added to an unrelated bill a provision that would make it illegal for banks and credit-card companies to settle payments for online gambling sites.

President Bush signed the law October 14.

The decision closed off the most lucrative region in a market worth $15.5 billion this year in "spend" value - the amount gambling companies win from their clients, or the amount gamblers lose.

Operations Shut Down

Several London-based Internet gambling companies and a handful in Europe and Australia subsequently sold off or shut down their U.S. operations, losing around 80 per cent of their combined business in the process.

U.S. officials have declined to participate in Tuesday's gambling summit in London, where lawmakers from 30 countries will discuss ways to regulate the industry, including the protection of minors and keeping the industry free of crime.

Reuters