Flutter’s Sky Betting & Gaming loses court case on customer data

The High Court of England and Wales found that Sky Betting and Gaming collected a claimant’s data without sufficient consent.

UK.- A Flutter Entertainment subsidiary has lost a case at the High Court of England and Wales over its collection of a customer’s data to send personalised direct marketing messages. Bonne Terre Ltd, which operates as Sky Betting and Gaming was found to have violated British data protection law by collecting data through cookies without sufficient consent.

The lawsuit was brought by a customer who claimed the Sky Betting and Gaming had taken advantage of his addiction to gambling. He received messages from the brand between 2017 and 2019. The claimant lost over £45,000 through gambling with Sky Betting and Gaming in a period of almost 10 years and claimed that the operator should have known that he had a problem gambler and that it illegally shared data with third parties.

Ravi Naik, a lawyer from data rights agency AWO who represented the claimant, said: “Hopefully this judgment will reduce harm to vulnerable people by serving as a warning to online gambling companies.”

Sky Betting and Gaming has said that it will consider whether to appeal the ruling. It added that it has made changes to its controls and processes since the time of the incident and would continue to invest in safer gambling. The judge said the decision was based on the specific circumstances of this case.

However, it’s not the first time that Sky Betting and Gaming has been in trouble over data issues. In September the Information Commissioner’s Office rapped the operator for sharing people’s personal information with advertising technology companies without their knowledge or consent over three months in 2023. In 2022, the Gambling Commission fined Sky Bet £1.17m for sending promotional messages to customers who had self-excluded.