WASHINGTON - An advocacy group for online poker says the federal government has frozen the accounts of payment processors that handle the winnings of thousands of online poker players.

The Poker Players Alliance says those winnings are worth upward of $30 million.

The alliance tells The Associated Press that the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York told three banks to freeze the accounts.

A document obtained by the AP shows that a judge in the district issued a seizure warrant last week for an account at a Wells Fargo bank in San Francisco.

The Justice Department has long maintained that Internet gambling is illegal, a view that the poker group challenges.