At that time, mostly unregulated, meaning there were no specific laws about real money online poker. Since the first poker sites debuted in the late 1990s, online poker in the US has existed for many years.
A brief recap of how this situation came to be is helpful to understand the current situation of the US Online Poker market. Currently, the states of Nevada, Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Michigan have regulated and legalized real money online poker sites.