The Lithuanian gaming oversight body has levied a penalty of €16,705 (£14,319/$18,259) on Baltic Betting Company for breaching rules concerning the advertising of gambling to the public.
Baltic Betting Company was sanctioned for displaying messages on its online platform that urged individuals to engage in gambling. These messages were visible between November 3, 2022, and February 28 of the current year.
The regulatory body also identified problems with Baltic Betting Company’s utilization of search terms to promote its Optibet brand on the Google search engine.
The regulatory body believes that combining keywords such as “Optibet Casino” and “Optibet Live Betting” would draw attention, resulting in increased traffic to the company’s online platform. This was deemed another infringement of Article 10, Paragraph 19 of the Gambling Law.
In response, the regulatory body imposed a fine on Baltic Betting Company and cautioned the company that further action would be taken if similar violations occurred again. The regulatory body demanded that Baltic Betting Company address these matters by July 7.
Baltic Betting Company has the option to appeal the decision.
Top Sport was penalized with a fine three times the amount.
In the beginning of this month, authorities levied three penalties against Top Sport, with the most recent fine following closely behind the others.
Over a period of just seven days, authorities imposed three fines on Top Sport. The initial penalty, amounting to €25,000, was issued for permitting underage individuals to enter one of their slot machine parlors. The investigation revealed that three individuals, at least one of whom was under the age of eighteen, were able to gain access to the establishment and remain there for over two hours. Authorities stated that Top Sport failed to take any measures to remove the three individuals from their premises.
Top Sport was subsequently fined €15,000 for breaching mobile gambling regulations. Authorities discovered that Top Sport’s gambling application was automatically placing bets. Upon users placing a wager on a live roulette table provided by Ezugi, the app would automatically repeat the bet once they secured their phones.
Lastly, the operator was penalized €15,000 for violating regulations concerning online account payments and deposits. One individual had utilized their own payment card to replenish the Top Sport accounts of two other players. Authorities asserted that this contravened gambling laws because Top Sport did not ensure that only account holders could deposit funds into their own accounts.
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