Creating a highly safe environment for players has always been for the online gambling industry.
Many regulators have been fighting against online criminal operations, fraud and illegal gambling operators for years, while at the same time trying to protect players.
The United Kingdom Gambling Commission (UKGC) is well-known for strict and serious regulation of businesses that provide gambling in the country.
In addition, the UKGC regularly penalizes businesses who do not operate in accordance with the rules, and this is the practice for all brands, including the most popular ones in the gambling industry.
Player Protection is Paramount
According to the latest news, the renowned gambling giant Sky Bet will have to pay a £1 million penalty, because – as the UKGC claims – it failed to protect vulnerable customers in multiple ways.
This penalty clearly means that all other gambling businesses who do not comply with the UKGC rules will have to suffer the same consequences.
Skybet’s failing is related to its customers who had self-excluded from gambling at the site. Self-exclusion is often used by players who think they are having trouble controlling their gambling habit and wish to cut down on gambling or completely stop with it.
It is mandatory for every gambling business to create a self-exclusion program, while the websites must deny access to self-excluded players.
What Happened?
According to a report by the BBC, some 736 self-excluded players were able to gamble on Sky Bet website using previously created duplicate accounts.
Moreover, around 50,000 self-excluded customers received advertising material via e-mail, mobile texts and push notifications.
36,748 self-excluded customers did not have their account balance funds returned to them on account closure.
Sky Bet decided to accept the penalty and cooperate with the Gambling Commission.
Chief executive at Sky Bet, Richard Flint admitted the company should have done more to protect the customers and assured the UKGC would take this investigation very seriously. He added the same mistake would not be repeated in the future.
The UKGC mission is to continue protecting customers from gambling-related harms, and it is certain they will take tough action if gambling brads fail to comply with the existing regulations.
