Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey said she is reviewing the legality of the Boston-based daily fantasy sports site DraftKings.
“This is a new industry. It’s something that we’re reviewing, and we’ll learn more about it,” she told the Massachusetts Statehouse News Service.
The move comes as debate over whether daily fantasy sports betting is gambling has been gaining some attention by local governments. At the federal level, New Jersey Congressman Frank Pallone has also requested that the House Energy and Commerce Committee hold a hearing on the legal status of daily fantasy sports.
There have also been reports that other states such as California and Nevada are also investigating daily fantasy sports’ legality.
According to the Las Vegas Review Journal, Nevada Gaming Control Board Chairman A.G. Burnett has asked the Nevada attorney general’s office to analyze daily fantasy sports and provide the board with guidance on the issue.
According to a report in Cardplayer.com, California is also considering whether it should regulate daily fantasy sports.
Fantasy sports received an exemption from the 1992 Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act and also The Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, which classified fantasy sports as a game of skill. But both exemptions were made before the concept of daily fantasy sports was created—as opposed to season-long contests—and prize money began to grow.
DraftKings recently responded on its website saying the company takes “the legal status of our contests very seriously. We are a US-based skill games company, and all of our contests are operated 100% legally under United States and Canadian law. The US Government and 45 of the 50 states consider fantasy sports a game of skill.”
