Denmark boosts illegal gambling enforcement, improving cooperation with app store owners

Denmark’s gambling regulator, Spillemyndigheden, intensified its crackdown on unlicensed online gambling in 2025, successfully securing court orders to block 334 illegal websites targeting Danish consumers. 

Published this week, Spillemyndigheden’s annual report detailed its 2025 campaign combining proactive searches, data analytics and public tips to identify illegal gambling websites. 

Collaboration with the Danish Tax Authority’s anti-fraud unit led to 695 potentially illicit platforms undergoing further investigation.

Subsequently, 334 websites were confirmed by courts as offering gambling services without Danish licences and were blocked. An additional 36 websites voluntarily removed or modified their gambling offerings after regulator intervention.

The regulator emphasised that the increase in website blocking primarily resulted from stepped-up surveillance efforts, rather than an expansion of the illegal market itself. A detailed channelisation report is scheduled for release later in 2026.

Evolution of blocking strategies

The report also evaluated the impact of DNS-level blocking on user behaviour. 

After blocking 178 sites in June 2025, third-party web traffic analyses indicated there was an approximate 34% reduction in visits over the subsequent six months, compared to the prior period. However, the regulator noted variability in these metrics, acknowledging that some blocked domains showed no measurable decline.

As part of the initiative, Spillemyndigheden updated its cooperation with Teleindustrien, the trade association for Danish internet service providers, enabling dynamic blocking of mirror or “clone” sites without having to seek new court orders for each instance.

The enforcement drive aligned with new legislative actions, notably the “Spilpakke 1” package, passed by a broad parliamentary majority in October 2025.

This package strengthened protections for children and vulnerable players and expanded the regulator’s authority. It explicitly empowered Spillemyndigheden to block referral and affiliate websites that direct Danish users to unlicensed operators and extend prohibitions on facilitation activities more broadly.

It also included a number of staunch new restrictions, including a whistle-to-whistle ban on gambling ads during live sports broadcasts, starting 10 minutes before the event and ending 10 minutes after the games conclude.   

Shifts across digital platforms

The report highlighted a shift in illegal gambling marketing through mobile applications on iOS and Android, as well as via social and streaming platforms. 

Spillemyndigheden formalised complaint mechanisms with Apple and Google to expedite the removal of illicit apps from Danish app stores. Licensed operators can now directly report brand misuse on Meta’s platforms, improving response times for content removal.

This shift in market retention reflects the broader digital evolution of Denmark’s gambling landscape. In their latest annual market review, online casinos overtook lotteries as the largest segment of the Danish gambling sector in 2025.

Online casinos generated the highest GGR of the market at DKK4.31 billion (38% of the market), up 12.1% (DKK465 million) year-on-year and more than doubling (+139%) since 2012. 

Online gambling continued to dominate the Danish market in 2025. It comprised 73% of the total GGR in 2025, up from 70% in 2024 and a dramatic increase from just 33% in 2012.

Mobile devices were the primary platform for online gambling. In 2025, 73% of online gambling revenue came through mobile devices, versus only 27% in 2012 for both online casino and betting combined.

Physical market enforcement and poker-related issues

On land-based gambling, Spillemyndigheden participated in 25 investigations related to the unlawful installation or operation of gambling machines and betting terminals in 2025. 

According to the market report, land-based casinos saw a 5.6% decline in GGR to DKK378 million (3% of the total gambling market). Newly liberalised land-based bingo appeared for the first time with a modest GGR of DKK30 million (less than 1%).