ASA issues warnings to two operators

The UK agency has warned to online gaming sites after ruling that adverts were appealing to children.

UK.- The Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) has issued warnings to two UK online gaming sites after it found that a series of adverts were appealing to children. The first complaint was received in January by group Fairer Gambling.

The campaign group contacted ASA earlier this year because it found that m88.com, run and owned by Progress Play, and Fun88.co.uk, which is operated by TGP Europe, was appealing to children in their adverts. The adverts cited contained words that would likely attract children.

While the sited removed the games and modified the graphics and said that the content would not appeal to children, ASA disagreed and said that the fact that they were based on fairytales meant that they could attract them.

“Because the ad promoted a game that was based on a fairy theme, which we considered was highly popular amongst young children, we concluded that the ad was likely to be of particular appeal to under-18s. The ads must not appear again in their current form; we told m88.com to ensure that their gambling ads did not have particular appeal to under-18s,” said the ruling.