Steve Hoare

Supreme Court of India evaluates blanket ban on online games

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A Public Interest Litigation (PIL) seeking a ban on online betting apps has forced India’s Supreme Court into talks with the likes of Google and Apple.

Dr K.A. Paul, the individual who filed the litigation, did so with the goal of safeguarding Indian youth and vulnerable people from unregulated online gambling.

Betting and gaming products are being ‘disguised as fantasy sports and skill-based games”, Paul and the other litigation issuers noted in their reasoning.

Within the PIL, there’s two high-profile cases referred to where online betting has led to some nefarious results.

The first involves 25 celebrities, including Bollywood actors, cricketers and influencers, allegedly promoting betting apps in a covert matter earlier in March, with the investigation still ongoing.

The second takes notice of a news article from the state of Telangana, where it’s said that 24 people took their lives as a result of debts incurred from online betting.

Paul and others are urging for the introduction of a uniform legislation for the regulation of online betting “in the name of the larger public interest to safeguard the youth of India from the unregulated, exploitative, and dangerous online betting industry operating under the garb of fantasy sports and skill-based gaming”.

Supreme Court Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi have now begun consultations on the matter with the Reserve Bank of India, the Enforcement Directorate, and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India.

Private entities with interests in the fantasy sports and online betting scene have also been contacted, such as app store monopolists Google and Apple, as well as major game platforms like A23 Games, Dream11, and Mobile Premier League.

The plea comes at a time when Google is considering relaxing its Real Money Games (RMG) policies for its India Play Store after initial plans to do so were put on hold last year – with the core reason being that India lacks a centralised regulatory framework for gambling.

In another recent development, though it is unclear whether it’s connected to the above, the Enforcement Directorate of India has summoned Google representatives to a hearing related to a suspected case of money laundering through online betting apps listed on the Play Store.

As it stands only three Indian states have regulated online gaming markets, Goa, Daman, and Sikkim. There were murmurs that another state, Karnataka, may launch a mixed market, but it appears that the state government’s ideal regulatory framework would only cover fantasy sports and some ‘games of skill’ like rummy, omitting and essentially banning online sports betting.

September 15 will see SBC organise a groundbreaking charity football event in Lisbon. Make sure you get the chance to see some of the most legendary names in football by securing your ticket today at https://www.legendscharitygame.com/

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Sportradar powers BETesporte’s responsible gambling push with AI

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In a significant move for the company’s ambitions in Brazil’s newly regulated betting market, Sportradar has partnered with BETesporte to implement Bettor Sense.

Bettor Sense has been described as an AI-powered, personalised solution that is designed to detect early signs of gambling-related risk.

BETesporte becomes the first operator in Brazil to adopt the platform as the firm looks to reinforce its commitment to more transparent betting whilst the country continues to embrace its new sector.

Tom Mace, SVP of Integrity and Regulatory Services, Product and Strategy at Sportradar, said: “This partnership with BETesporte marks an important milestone for Sportradar’s ongoing mission to help shape secure and sustainable sports betting and iGaming industries.

“BETesporte is taking a proactive step in embracing responsible gaming as a core part of its business. We are confident this will be the first of many partnerships, as the market increasingly recognises the value of using data and technology to protect end users and strengthen compliance.”

The agreement also sees BETesporte join Sportradar’s Integrity Exchange, a global information-sharing network with the aim of combating betting-related corruption and match-fixing.

“Sportradar’s advanced technology enables us to anticipate and prevent risky behaviour, ensuring our bettors have the best possible experience with complete safety,” added Marcos Pereira, CEO of BETesporte.

“We will continue working tirelessly to protect the integrity of sport and the trust of our users, which remains our top priority.”

AI’s growing impact
Bettor Sense utilises AI and behavioural research to provide personalised interventions that help operators identify and support players exhibiting risky behaviour, before problems escalate.

This proactive approach marks a shift from traditional reactive responsible gambling measures, giving operators a tool to promote player safety and meet the increasing regulatory demands in the region.

The move sees Sportradar eying further opportunities to expand its reach into other parts of the sector other than just sportstech. As markets worldwide strengthen responsible gambling requirements, AI-driven tools like Bettor Sense are becoming increasingly popular for carrying out compliance tasks.

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Tipico maintains low levels of gambling harm in 2024 ESG report

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Tipico has placed problem gambling and player protection at the forefront of its 2024 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) report, published this week.

According to the figures, the company kept turnover from potentially problematic gambling behaviour below 1.5% for the full year. This figure includes activity from customers who would later self-exclude or be excluded before protective interventions were triggered.

Tipico says maintaining the share below this metric reflects the effectiveness of its early detection systems and is a ‘central focus’ in its broader responsible gambling strategy.

Axel Hefer, CEO of Tipico, stated: “This ESG report reflects our commitment to long-term value creation for all stakeholders, and it shows that growth and responsibility go hand in hand at Tipico. We are very proud of the progress we’ve made in 2024 – the year of the UEFA Euro.”

Meanwhile, the company launched its first nationwide responsible gambling television campaign in 2024, which reached more than four million viewers via sports broadcasts and online platforms.

The campaign formed part of a broader approach that includes continued funding for research, access to treatment programmes, as well as external evaluations of the company’s player protection practices.

SG – a vital ingredient
While problem gambling continues to attract attention across Europe, Tipico’s report positions harm prevention and data-driven intervention as essential components of its operating model.

The group’s focus on problem gambling prevention comes amid a wider debate about player protection in Germany. Operators, represented by the DWSV trade body, argue that the best way to protect players is by preventing them from exposure to the black market, but the GGL regulator believes that licensed firms need to take more responsibility.

“Our ESG strategy is about building a sustainable, forward-looking organisation that puts people first and sets consumer protection, integrity and our people at the core of all our operations,” added Christian Wurzinger, Tipico’s CFO.

“Our achievements in responsible gaming and the ongoing development of our teams are a strong testament to this commitment.”

Elsewhere in the report, the company outlined developments in employee training and environmental sustainability. Tipico delivered over 15,000 hours of training in 2024, with an emphasis on leadership and career development across its workforce.

The company also stated it is on track to meet its target of carbon neutrality by 2030. In 2024, it reduced Scope 2 CO₂e emissions by 41% year-on-year and introduced office-wide recycling initiatives. These changes contributed to the company achieving ISO 14001 environmental certification in 2025.

Global push for safety
Tipico isn’t the only gambling operator to see the importance of sustainability in gambling, particularly amid widespread public and political concerns across various European markets

Back In February 2021, Swedish firm Kindred (now owned by French firm FDJ United) launched a sustainability campaign titled ‘Journey to Zero’ to eliminate harmful gambling revenue. It looked to reduce the share of gross winnings revenue generated from high‑risk players to 0%.

Kindred has gradually made progress toward its aim, and by the third quarter of 2023, revenue from high‑risk players had reduced to 3.1%, up from around 3.3% in Q3 2023, with an improvement rate of 87.4% in customer behaviour after interventions

Other markets like the UK, meanwhile, continue to see extensive charity initiatives, now funded by a mandatory statutory levy paid by licenced UK operators, a requirement of the 2005 Gambling Act review White Paper.

A recent development saw training from the Young Gamers and Gamblers Education Trust (YGAM) deliver strong results in helping Health and Social Care practitioners spot and respond to gambling and gaming harms in young people, according to an evaluation by Rocket Science.

The report found that after completing the training, practitioners were 72% better at identifying harmful behaviours. Their knowledge of gaming and gambling risks jumped from 14.8% to 95.1%.

Confidence levels also rose sharply, with a 91.9% increase in their ability to talk to young people about these issues, and a 92.8% improvement in providing support and guidance.

September 15 will see SBC organise a ground breaking charity football event in Lisbon. Make sure you get the chance to see some of the most legendary names in football by securing your ticket today at https://www.legendscharitygame.com/

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Erdogan’s top lieutenant questions Turkey’s fight on illegal gambling 

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Turkish authorities praised progress on campaigns and initiatives to tackle social harms and improve public health at the annual meeting of the High Council for Combatting Addiction.

Chaired by Vice President Cevdet Yılmaz at the Presidential Complex, authorities detailed progress in implementing 88 of 91 directives proposed in 2019 by the Ministry of the Interior and public health organisation YEŞİLAY (Green Crescent).

The session highlighted Turkey’s strengthened multi-institutional efforts across a broad range of addiction-related challenges to map drug prevention, smoking cessation, alcohol control, and digital safety.

Ministries presented data-backed updates on ongoing work: expanded rehabilitation facilities, increased cessation clinics, educational programmes in schools, and reinforced customs surveillance to combat narcotics smuggling.

For a government that has been grappling with economic strain and political unrest, the High Council offered a moment of policy coherence.

The Erdogan administration has been focused on addiction prevention for some time, and the issue has received structured, multi-agency attention.

Under Yılmaz’s stewardship, ministries have aligned prevention, enforcement, and education efforts with an eye toward long-term social stability.

But beneath the polished progress report lay a conspicuous omission: virtual gambling (“sanal bahis”), a fast-expanding sector that the government has done little to contain.

Yılmaz, who is viewed as President Erdoğan’s strict taskmaster having overseen policing, addiction programs, economic reform agendas, and development planning. He conceded that the government has no meaningful picture of gambling addiction in Turkey, despite its growing social and economic toll.

The reason for this blind spot is political as much as institutional. Illicit online gambling thrives in the gaps between financial technology, enforcement apathy, and political convenience. While law enforcement has made strides in dismantling drug networks, gambling remains a topic few in Ankara are willing to broach with urgency.

The AK government has called on federal police and intelligence agencies to draw up a national action plan. But few believe such a plan will reach the top of the government’s priority list. The issue, long aired by Ali Babacan, a former AK Party minister turned opposition leader, implicates individuals and networks with ties to Erdoğan’s inner circle.

Doubts persist about whether the ruling party has the political appetite to pursue a crackdown that might expose uncomfortable affiliations — or worse, unseat sources of informal revenue.

The unease deepened with the recent arrest of Ahmed Faruk Karslı, CEO of Istanbul-based fintech app Papara in May – a business once regarded as “Turkey’s Fintech Unicorn”.

Karslı was detained by Police Intelligence on charges of corruption, following revelations that Papara facilitated over 26,000 accounts for illegal betting transactions, worth a staggering ₺12.9bn (around €340m).

The scandal underscores not only the scope of Turkey’s underground betting economy, but also the digital financial architecture that enables it.

The government’s silence on Papara, beyond routine legal proceedings has raised eyebrows. As fintech expands and mobile payments surge, regulators seem reluctant to confront the platforms that blur the line between convenience and criminality.

The timing is awkward. President Erdoğan’s approval ratings are at their lowest in years, following a wave of political arrests in Istanbul this May.

In response, long fragmented opposition parties have found new momentum to attack Erdoğan’s regime, yet will not form a majority in Parliament to trigger a snap election, as was assumed following protests and strikes in May.

Erdoğan’s conservative image has long rested on moral authority: anti-drug, pro-family, socially traditional. Yet gambling, especially when enabled by financial actors with AK Party links, threatens to puncture that narrative.

If Yılmaz’s remarks were intended as a warning shot, they may also be a signal of internal rifts within the administration—between technocrats who see the policy gap and party loyalists unwilling to fill it.

Yılmaz posed a simple question at the council’s close: “Should we impose safeguards against gambling as we have for other digital threats?”

It is a question few in Turkey’s ruling elite have dared ask. But if the government wishes to retain control of the national narrative on addiction, the time for political caution may be over.

Online gambling is not just a vice; it is a systemic risk—one that straddles public health, criminal finance, and political integrity. Leaving it unaddressed may not only jeopardize social stability. It may also cost the government its last claims to moral leadership.

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GAMSTOP says problem gambling awareness is high

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GAMSTOP has highlighted that people in the UK have a generally high knowledge of problem gambling tools at their disposal.

This was noted in the self-exclusion scheme’s latest report on registration activity, which showed more than 600,000 registrations and around 525,000 active self-exclusions from online gambling in the UK. In total, this constituted a growth of 100,000 registrants over the last 11 months.

“Such unprecedented growth in registrations indicates a widespread need for self-exclusion and highlights the crucial role of the gambling harm prevention, education, treatment and support sector,” GAMSTOP wrote on social media.

“We are proud to have formed strong, collaborative relationships with a wide range of organisations to help ensure that we provide signposting to a robust network of support to our service users.”

GAMSTOP further reminded that it will soon start only using active exclusions as a metric as outdated user account information will gradually be archived starting 25 October.

That way, people whose minimum exclusion period expired more than seven years ago will have their personal data stored separately from more fresh data. In comparison, active exclusions will serve as a more accurate representation of problem gambling in the UK, with the current figures of over half a million representing 1% of the adult population.

Generally considered to have one of the best responsible gambling frameworks in Europe, the UK is currently gearing up to implement even more policies to make play safer.

Back in 2023, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) – based on recommendations from the Gambling Act Review White Paper – announced the NHS as the sole commissioner of an annual £100m Research, Education, and Treatment (RET) levy funding, paid by UK operators.

Developed in conjunction with the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID) to serve as treatment support commissioner, the levy will ensure that the entire UK problem gambling support network will be operated outside of any influence from the gambling sector.

GambleAware, a charity that served as the previous commissioner of voluntary RET donations, has announced that it will close down by March 2026.

September 15 will see SBC organise a ground breaking charity football event in Lisbon. Make sure you get the chance to see some of the most legendary names in football by securing your ticket today at https://www.legendscharitygame.com/

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iGaming Daily: Gambling support threatened by suit that could silence 1-800-GAMBLER

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In this episode of iGaming Daily, brought to you by Optimove, Jessica Welman and Charlie Horner, delve into the legal battle surrounding the National US Gambling Support Hotline, 1-800-GAMBLER. At stake is the continued operation of a lifeline for countless Americans struggling with gambling addiction. Managed by the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG), the…

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Dutch party promises more gambling control if elected

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As an election approaches in the Netherlands, gambling is shaping up to be a major talking point for winning the electorate over.

Parties are already putting out their election plans ahead of the October vote, with one of them being centre-right VVD.

Dilan Yeşilgöz-Zegerius/VVD
Led by Dilan Yeşilgöz-Zegerius, the party has embedded a promise into its manifesto to increase the powers of Kansspelautoriteit (KSA) – the Dutch gambling authority.

By doing so, the VVD hopes to achieve a more effective approach towards reducing rates of online gambling harm, as well as stricter control over the market and better results when combatting illegal iGaming providers.

Cited by Casinonieuws.nl, the manifesto read: “Online gambling: We are reforming the Remote Gambling Act to combat gambling addiction.

“We give the Gaming Authority more powers to supervise online gambling providers and take enforcement action.

“In consultation with other European member states, there must also be a creative approach to combat illegal gambling companies that is in line with the approach to criminal networks.”

The above falls in line not only with common European interests against the black market, but also with a number of other developments relating to online gambling in the Netherlands.

Legal Protections Secretary Teun Struycken is currently spearheading a list of Remote Gambling Act 2021 (KOA) reforms that already foresee the gambling regulator becoming equipped with more powers. VVD now promises to expedite this process.

The party’s focus on gambling is most likely driven by continuous warnings from the sector that the black market has now reached a concerning size which threatens Dutch consumers.

At the most recent Gaming in Holland conference, Arjan Blok, CEO of the Dutch state lottery, stated that 25% of customers are engaging with unlicensed operators, leading to a loss of €1.3bn.

VVD has clearly heard these concerns. Its manifesto to tackle the black market carries proper weight due to the party’s size. It was one of the four-party coalition governments that fell apart earlier this year, which led to new elections being scheduled for 29 October.

September 15 will see SBC organise a ground breaking charity football event in Lisbon. Make sure you get the chance to see some of the most legendary names in football by securing your ticket today at https://www.legendscharitygame.com/

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