German gambling regulator commissions player protection study 

The study will be conducted by the University of Bremen.

Germany.- The German federal gambling regulator, Gemeinsamen Glücksspielbehörde der Länder (GGL), has appointed the University of Bremen to carry out a player protection study. The university, in Lower Saxony, will evaluate the effects of Germany’s “extensive player protection requirements” implemented under the Fourth Interstate Gambling Treaty, which came into effect on July 1, 2021.

The university will evaluate “both general technical requirements and game-specific requirements that affect the long-permissible online gambling as well as new permissible forms of gambling on the internet”. It will look at practicability and adaptations to changes in player behaviour.

The GGL said it had chosen the University of Bremen for its experience in researching public health disciplines, noting that it has one of Germany’s largest research institutes in this area.

The study will be led by Dr. Tobias Hayer of the University of Bremen’s Institute for Public Health and Nursing. He said: “I am very pleased about this contract and hope to be able to make a substantial contribution to the evaluation of the Gambling State Treaty with the results.”

In June, the GGL named Udo Götze as its new chair. He replaced Jorg Sibbel from July 1. The German regulator only became fully functional in January but its regulations state that a new chair must take over on July 1 every year. Germany’s 16 federal states take turns choosing the chair. Götze is a state secretary at the Ministry of the Interior and Municipal Affairs in the Free State of Thuringia.