Mobile gaming is quickly becoming the next big thing, and with the growing and changing audience it is becoming increasingly important that regulation and protection is in place to protect users. This has been seen recently in the UK, but other methods are also taking place in other parts of Europe – this such instance is a self inclusion initiative called Gamstop which aims to help reduce the number of problem gamblers.

Part of the issue here, however, is that as users become unable to access many of their favourite gaming sites and services through the initiative, they may start to seek out alternative places to play – due to the spread of the coronavirus there has already been a surge in new users taking part in mobile gambling with other preventative measures to reduce the risk of addiction, for example – but many of these other sites may not be the safest to use. There are those that are regulated even as they register outside of the UK as an Agent Spins review here shows, but there is still plenty of wiggle room for those who register outside of the UK to remain unlicensed, and there lies the rub.

Now these unlicensed sites may not be a problem for experienced players, as they’ll be able to spot the risk early on – but for new players this could spell trouble. As of April this year, it was made mandatory for all UK operators to join the initiative which could have far reaching consequences – because of this, the number of users looking for these alternative sites that may not be licensed will in turn increase – those who get caught out by these sites may look to be compensated for their loss, and whilst they may be unable to look for lost damages from the unlicensed casino, they may look toward the regulation and how the changes put in place simply block access, whilst not educating on the dangers of seeking out other services to play.

There have been other issues with the regulation too that could lead to trouble – the first teething issue that came is although players were unable to use these sites and services, marketing materials were still going out. The initiative was launched to help reduce problem gamblers exposure to these sites, but by self including players would only remove their ability to participate, and there had been a wave of complaints that emails and messages were still being sent to them encouraging them to play again – if users are unable to seek damages from the use of other services that may not be safe to use, this may be another area that could open the regulation up to damages. The initiative was only launched in late 2018, so any issues are still being ironed out, but now that it is mandatory for operators, many other issues may become obvious – the initiative is already being held to high success and regard, but that could also lead to a bigger fall.