WinBet banned in Sweden for unlicensed gambling
Sweden gambling regulator Spelinspektionen has banned WinBet NV for illegally targeting Swedish players through its Superb.bet website.
Spelinspektionen launched an investigation into WinBet, and discovered the operator only holds a licence in Greece.
Under Swedish law, an operator can be seen as targeting players in the country if its website meets certain criteria. This include offering a Swedish language version for users and offering payment methods only available in Sweden.
WinBet met several of these criteria. Spelinspektionen found Superb.bet automatically set to Swedish language when visited from an IP address in the country. Swedish players were also able to register without any form of prevention, despite the site not being licensed.
Spelinspektionen offered WinBet the opportunity to respond to the charges, but it did not comment. With this, the regulator proceeded to ban WinBet, with this coming into immediate effect.
WinBet Swedish ban follows Dutch warning
Incidentally, this is not the first time WinBet has faced regulatory action. WinBet was also warned over its activity by Dutch regulator Kansspelautoriteit last October.
Kansspelautoriteit discovered WinBet was operating online games of chance without the required licence. This was apparent across four sites: Galaxyspins.com, Winnercasino1.bet, Superb1.bet and Doctorspins.com – none of which were approved in the Netherlands.
The operator was ordered to withdraw or face weekly penalty payment order of €280,000. This would be issued each week until the maximum of €840,000 was reached.
Trio cleared over compliance concerns Sweden
In other news, Spelinspektionen has cleared three operators of any wrongdoing in relation to compliance concerns.
In June, AB Trav och Galopp (ATG), Svenska Spel Sport & Casino, and Lotto Direct became the subject of extra focus from Spelinspektionen. It initiated supervision to check compliance with certain reporting requirements.
However, the supervision did not discover anything that warranted further action. As such, all three cases were closed.