KSA Fines Casbit Group for Offering Unlicensed Gambling Content

Article by : Milena Petrovska Apr 18, 2024

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The Dutch Gaming Authority (KSA) has fined Casbit Group NV for offering unlicensed online gambling services via the Lala.bet website. The KSA informed Casbit Group of its breaches in law earlier and the operator seemingly blocked players from the Netherlands.

However, a later inspection proved that Dutch players could still register and play at the site. As such, the KSA ordered Casbit to stop offering its unregulated services immediately. If not, the latter will have to pay a hefty penalty of €280,000 per week. The maximum fine can go as high as €840,000.

Decision Part of Process of Making Dutch Gambling Market Safe

Under the Dutch Gambling Act, operators that don’t have a license from the KSA can’t offer their services to players from the Netherlands. To prevent this, the KSA uses various measures such as creating barriers at payment providers or issuing warnings.

In the case of Casbit Group, the regulator only warned it the first time the irregularities were noticed. However, the operator continued with its unregulated operations, bringing the KSA’s wrath upon itself.

According to our research findings, Lala.bet was investigated on July 27, 2023, and August 16, 2023.

On July 27, a supervisor registered and deposited via Mastercard. He used the funds to play games of chance. Then, he logged back in on August 16 and found out that he could still play for real money. Following the development, the supervisor re-checked the situation on January 9, 2024, and was still able to access the website.

After announcing the news, the KSA stated that these actions were the result of its efforts to make the market safer for players. That way, they could rest assured that fair play was always enforced and that they were “protected against gambling addiction.”

The statement went on to conclude that those who offer illegal games of chance undermined the system. As such, they couldn’t be trusted.

Casbit Group Challenging the Decision

Just like any other entity under scrutiny, Casbit was given the right to challenge KSA’s final decision. After investigating the situation, we found that the company was actually challenging the fine. However, there weren’t any updates on the matter, so time will tell what the final call will be.

Casbit holds a license from Curacao and operates numerous casino websites. In addition to Lala.bet, it stands behind BetSpino, Boomerang.bet, JungliWIN Casino, JustBit Casino, True Flip Casino, and 0x.bet Casino.

KSA Constantly Focused on Tackling Illegal Operations

In the recent period, the KSA has been increasingly active in blocking illegal services in the Netherlands. At the start of April, the regulator reached an agreement with Cloudflare to tackle suspicious websites.

The step came after imposing two binding instructions on the company after suspecting it was facilitating illegal offers. Later discussions revealed that the findings were incorrect.

KSA investigated Onlinecasinosspelen.com and Nderlandscasinos.net but was unable to find the identities of their owners.

According to the new agreement, the KSA can question Cloudflare to provide more information about the parties being investigated and facilitate cracking down on illegal gambling. That’s exactly what the KSA did when inspecting the two operators.

A few days after the agreement with Cloudflare was reached, the KSA imposed a binding instruction on DigitalOcean, a hosting provider. According to the instructions, DigitalOcean is required to terminate any services provided to illegal affiliate websites.