(AsiaGameHub) –   The Gambling Commission is calling on stakeholders to call out companies that are not effectively addressing the problem of the black market.

Addressing the Ethical Gambling Forum, the UK regulator’s Executive Director, Tim Miller, stated the commission ‘will become increasingly vocal in drawing attention’ to firms that fail to shield consumers from illegal gambling and encouraged attendees to ‘lend your voices to that cause’.

“We cannot allow inaction by others to undermine our efforts,” Miller cautioned. “Our ongoing work to tackle the illegal gambling market has revealed that the growing visibility and accessibility of illegal sites is another instance of big tech being too slow to act, only deploying their substantial resources for harm prevention when strongly compelled to.

“The future of that market hinges on all of us collaborating with a common goal to continue providing an innovative and engaging consumer experience within a well-regulated framework centered on fairness and safety.”

Miller’s comments extend his earlier critique of social media giant Meta, which he said in January must increase its efforts to stop illegal gambling ads on its platforms.

This follows research from the Marketing Intelligence firm WARC, which predicted just a week ago that black market advertising expenditure will exceed that of the regulated sector by 2028.

The government allocated the regulator £26m over three years in November’s Autumn budget to combat the black market. Miller stressed that the commission aims to ‘ramp up our action’ against the illegal market by working with other regulators and law enforcement agencies.

In addition to the funding, the government has established an illegal gambling taskforce to enhance cross-agency cooperation between law enforcement and major tech firms such as Google, Meta, and Visa.

Providing a progress report on the task force, Miller expressed satisfaction with its initial advancements but warned that it must produce concrete outcomes and not ‘become a talking shop’.

Mythbusting financial risk assessments

Another key priority for Miller was the Gambling Commission’s justification for the potential introduction of financial risk assessments, which have faced criticism from parts of the gambling industry.

He referenced a recent blog post from the Gambling Commission that labeled the discourse surrounding the checks as ‘ill-informed or inaccurate’. Miller reaffirmed that the assessments – a central proposal of the 2023 Gambling White Paper – are intended to remove the necessity for operators to request financial paperwork from players.

Critics have challenged the supposedly frictionless quality of the assessments, a core requirement of their implementation per the white paper, alleging they are simply ‘affordability checks’ by another name.

“Let me be clear, the proposed thresholds for an assessment are not limits or caps on customer spend,” Miller stated. “The checks we have been piloting will not even try to evaluate what any individual customer can afford to gamble.”

The UK regulator reports that its pilot study found only one in 1,000 customers who meet the current thresholds for an assessment will be unable to complete them seamlessly – a result that exceeds the white paper’s projections.

Miller underscored that there are no ‘predetermined next steps’ for implementing financial risk assessments. The Gambling Commission will now present its recommendations to its Board for further review before outlining future plans.

He concluded: “If the decision is made to introduce these assessments, we will collaborate closely with DCMS, the industry, and credit reference agencies to form an implementation group. This group will work together to develop the specifics of a sensible implementation plan and schedule.

“It will also assist in formulating guidance for operators to guarantee they adopt a proportionate method for interacting with customers when a financial risk is detected.”