London ? Britain’s culture secretary Friday compared the U.S. 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 Oct. 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.