Dutch regulator KSA issues a €400,000 fine to 1XBet

by Luke Andrews, 26 February 2019

Dutch regulator, Kansspelautoriteit (KSA), has issued 1XBet with a €400,000 fine for targeting Dutch consumers without the relevant permissions.

The KSA has issued the operator with a €400k fine. © Pixabay.

The groups behind the 1xBet.com and xbet-1.com websites, 1x Corp N.V and Exinvest Limited respectively, have been fined by the KSA for allowing the websites to be easily accessible for Dutch consumers.

The KSA found that the websites had features such as a Dutch language option, a deposit method only available for Dutch customers, and could be accessed by Dutch IP addresses. Neither operator had received a licence or permission to operate in Holland by the KSA.

The KSA also accused the two owning companies of offering 83 other gambling websites that could be accessed with the user credentials as for the two domains.

Chair of the KSA, René Jansen, said:

Online gambling in the Netherlands is illegal; under the current legal regime for companies it is not possible to get a licence for offering online games of chance. Consumers are not assured of a safe game on an honest market with illegal providers.– René Jansen KSA Chair.

Just last week, the 3-year passage of the Remote Gaming Bill came to an end in Holland, when it was finally passed through by the Senate. Operators can expect to gain a Dutch licence some time in 2020.

However, much of the pre-vote debate centered around treatment of those operators who had acted illegally in Holland prior to the passing of the legislation. That led to a side vote on the issue, with lawmakers approving a motion to introduce a cooling off period on operators who had been found to have acted illegally in Holland in the past.

A definition of what constitutes acting illegally has not yet been given. With the regulator ruling against them, 1XBet are likely to be one of the operators denied a licence in the early stages of the new Dutch market.

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