The Center for Democracy and Technology, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky Thursday with the Kentucky Court of Appeals, asking the court to overturn rulings made on Sept. 18 and Oct. 16 by Franklin Circuit Judge Thomas Wingate. Wingate ruled that the domain names are illegal "gambling devices" under Kentucky law, and he gave the gambling Web sites until Monday to come up with ways to block access by Kentucky residents or face forfeiture of those domain names to the state.

Wingate's ruling would force registrars to turn over the domain names of sites such as Pokerstars.com, Fulltiltpoker.com, Sportsbook.com and Goldenpalace.com.

The three civil liberties groups argued that Wingate's order raises serious free-speech concerns and violates the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which says the U.S. Congress has the power to regulate commerce between U.S. states. The judge also does not have the jurisdiction to force domain name registrars to turn over the domain names, and the decision to target domain names is an odd way to shut down Web sites, the three groups wrote in their brief.

Domain names are simply addresses pointing Web users to the proper Web sites, lawyers for the groups wrote.

"If allowed to stand, the court's flawed order would needlessly create uncertainty about the basic rules governing the operation of the Internet as well as the authority of courts both inside and outside of the United States to affect behavior in other jurisdictions," the groups wrote. "Moreover, if carried to its logical conclusion, the trial court's order could well impose literally billions of dollars of additional costs on individuals and businesses throughout the world that have no significant contacts with Kentucky."