Danish gambling regulator wins blocking order against 82 unlicensed sites

Spillemyndigheden has blocked 227 unlicensed gaming sites to date.

Denmark.- The Frederisksberg court has granted the Danish gaming regulator Spillemyndigheden an order to block 82 unlicensed websites that were offering gaming to Danish consumers. The latest list of blocks is the longest that the regulator has issued to date.

The court decision is the eighth since the opening of the Danish market under the Gambling Act in 2012. To date, 227 sites have been blocked. Spillemyndigheden monitors online gaming operators to identify unlicensed offers, including through the use of tipoffs from the public and licensed operators.

It looks for features targeting Danish players, including the use of the Danish language, customer service in Danish and accepting Danish currency or payment cards. In the event that it detects unlicensed offerings, it asks the operator to stop targeting Danish players. If they don’t, it goes to court to request an order for Danish internet service providers to block the sites.

Spillemyndigheden director Anders Dorph said: “Spillemyndigheden was established to ensure a framework for a fair gambling market. One of our most important tasks in that context is to protect players against illegal gambling and to ensure they are not exposed to gambling providers that do not have a licence in Denmark.

“At the same time, it is very important that we ensure that operators who are licensed to offer gambling in Denmark can run their business under ordered conditions.”

Spillemyndigheden recently reported the results of a study into Denmark’s gambling helpline, StopSpillet, which it launched in 2019. It said the results showed that the helpline was reaching its targets and meeting requirements.

The study shows that 87 per cent of callers are men and 35 per cent are men between the ages of 18 and 25. It found that half of callers began gambling before they were 18, which the regulator said backed up other research that had found a correlation between gambling at an early age and developing an addiction.

Danish gambling revenue came in at DKK1.69bn (€227m) for Q2, an increase of 7.4 per cent year-on-year. Revenue from online gambling and sports betting fell, but the reopening of land-based casinos after Covid-19 restrictions last year pushed overall revenue up.

Spillemyndigheden reported that land-based casino revenue was up 163.4 per cent at DKK97m. Land-based slots revenue rose 95.4 per cent to DKK319m. However, online casino revenue, the largest source of gambling revenue, slipped by 1 per cent to DKK708m and sports betting revenue dropped 14.1 per cent to DKK565m.