Powerball and Mega Millions going bye-bye too

Illinois Lottery players should prepare for a bit of deja vu — with a twist — if Illinois leaders don't pass a budget by Friday night.

Not only will the popular Powerball and Mega Millions tickets be off the shelf, but also any big winners of any of the other draw or instant games will have to wait to collect their cash.

The Illinois Lottery announced Tuesday that, without a budget or any...

A network of dummy online stores offering household goods has been used as a front for internet gambling payments, according to a recent investigation.

The seven sites, operated out of Europe, purport to sell items including fabric, DVD cases, maps, gift wrap, mechanical tape, pin badges and flags. In fact, they are fake outlets, part of a multinational system to disguise payments for the $40 billion global online gambling industry, which is illegal in many countries and some U.S. states.

The findings raise questions about how e-commerce is policed worldwide. They also underline a strategy which fraud specialists say regulators, card issuers and banks have yet to tackle head-on. 

A Chicago woman won $250,000 from her first-ever lottery ticket, which she wasn't even planning to buy.

La Ongkwan Pinyapap instantly won the top prize after scratching a 25X The Money ticket, the Illinois Lottery said Wednesday in a statement. 

"This is the very first lottery ticket I have ever played!" she said. "My friend was buying a ticket, so I thought I should try one, too. We couldn't believe it when I won!"

Pinyapap bought her ticket at the BP gas station on W. Fullerton Ave. in the city's Bucktown neighborhood and took it home to scratch. 

Trips to neighboring states to observe their lottery operations have shed light on the types of decisions that must be made should Mississippi opt to enact a lottery, two Northeast Mississippi legislators recently said.

A Michigan man has won his second Michigan Lottery Fantasy 5 jackpot in 18 months.

The Iowa Supreme Court has dismissed the conviction of an Iowa man who just last week pleaded guilty in federal court to charges related with rigging lottery computers in order to win jackpots, but the dismissal has little practical impact on the case.

Your ability to buy lottery tickets from vending machines in Kansas may depend on how many lawmakers show up for the ceremonial last day of the session Monday.

A bill passed in the Pennsylvania House would allow casino-style gambling in airports, veterans halls, and truck stops.

The Oklahoma Lottery is revamping its products and marketing strategy in light of a recent law change removing the requirement that 35 percent of its profits go to education.

Eddie Tipton, the now-infamous former security chief at the Multi-State Lottery Association (MUSL), is accused of installing software on Random Number Generators that allowed him to predict winning combinations for drawings that occurred on three dates every non-leap year — Nov. 23, Dec. 29 and May 27.