Danish gaming regulator gets go-ahead to block 55 sites
Spillemyndigheden has gained approval from the city court in Copenhagen after websites refused to halt operations.
Denmark.- The national gambling regulator Spillemyndigheden has gained approval from Copenhagen’s City Court to block 55 unlicensed gaming websites that it says were targeting Danish customers.
The regulator had already ordered the igaming sites to cease operations but its orders fell on deaf ears.
The court agreed with Spillemyndigheden that the websites were proven to have offered games in Denmark without licences, thus breaching national regulations.
Spillemyndigheden says it has begun the process of blocking the 55 sites, although the operators may still appeal.
The sites include online casino brands, skin betting operators and sites that offer online lottery or betting in addition to casino.
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Skin betting operators accounted for almost half of the sites. Four of those operate under the Csgetto brand and four under GGdrop.
The 22 sites offering online casino included Easybet.com, KingBillyCasino.com and Slotjoint.com.
Four sites, including Dafabet, Justbet.co, DF Bet and Casino Oziris offered online betting as well as casino.
A record number of blocked sites
The latest list of sites to be blocked is the largest single case of new blocking action since the Danish gaming regulator began blocking websites in 2012. To date, it has blocked 145 domains including those on the latest list.
Spillemyndigheden director Anders Dorph said: “One of our most important tasks is to protect players from illegal gambling, at the same time, we must ensure that the providers who are licensed to offer games in Denmark can run their business under orderly conditions.
“The record-high number [of blocking orders] clearly shows that there is a need for the targeted effort, and we will therefore maintain the increased focus in the future.”
According to figures from Spillemyndigheden, Danish gambling revenue fell by 9.3 per cent year-on-year to DKK5.96bn (€801.8m) in 2020.
