“Online gambling and child protection" ICT Coalition Forum Brussels, 18 April 2013 Florian Cartoux, EGBA

EGBA: Who we are 2  Highly regulated industry with operators holding licenses in a growing number of EU Member States  Products include online sports betting, poker and casino  Sector not harmonised, but included in growing secondary EU legislation  Maintaining high level standards

At the forefront of E-commerce 3  Europe global leader in online gambling with 45% market share  Young industry at the forefront of digital economy  Innovation: Internet, mobile phones, tablets, digital TV  Broadband penetration: Malta example  Jobs: 1,900 working for Swedish private betting companies & 7,000 in Malta  Security: Over 20 methods of payments accepted with standard operator

Underage gambling: An absolute No-No 4  Forms part of all national licensing requirements  18 minimum age limit in most Member States (others 21)  Customers must provide name, age, address and unique username and password details  No advertising targeted towards underage individuals  Complemented also by self regulatory initiatives (CEN)  Links to recognised filtering programme to assist customers/parents  Account closed and refunded immediately if underage gambling is identified or suspected  Training to all employees involved in age verification  External audits

Underage gambling: What is the situation today? 5  Limited data on the scale of the problem  0.023% of all new customers in all countries (Unibet)  Regulated markets show high success of keeping children off online websites  “It is true that no system is ever going to be entirely foolproof but the example of gambling in the UK appears to show that some can work to a very high level of efficiency” CHIS study October 2010  “2% of children (amongst 11-15) have ever used online gambling “ Ipsos Mori Research Institute 2011  Regulation of online gambling guarantees transparency and traceability

Age identification: How does it work? 6  Majority of Member States have diverging approaches:  Some check via publicly available information (UK)  Some check through fiscal codes (Italy)  Some use a mix of paper verification (France)  Others have no explicit know your customer requirements (Germany)  Need for e-tools (DK and ES) to improve efficiency of e- ID and offer  Need for EU common standards:  Directive for e-identification does not oblige MS to introduce e-ID A complete fragmented approach – No internal market

Social gaming and online gambling 7  Main difference with online gambling:  No definition of social gaming per se  Players play for free (though 1-5% are paying players)  Players can not win money from playing or paying for the social game  Players usually under the age of 18 can play  Status of legislation:  Online gambling: Heavily regulated at national level, subject to growing EU secondary legislation  Social gaming: As information society services subject to many EU directives

Should social games be subject to gambling regulation? 8  Growing scrutinity from gambling regulators, but no clear call for extra regulation  However, three topics may evolve the debate over time:  Age verification: Should social games be subject to same requirements as gambling operators?  Addiction: Do players on social games need player protection tools like for online gambling?  Fraud: Do players need protection from potential fraudulent business practices?