Thailand’s Ministry of Digital Economy (DE) is taking proactive steps against illegal online gambling.
Ministry officials met with representatives from a number of public health organisations to devise joint strategies going forward. These strategies will be built on four key pillars, including the possibility of working with social media platforms directly.
Official government communication channels will be open for the public to either report instances of illegal gambling or offer mechanisms on how to combat it more efficiently.
Cooperation will also be improved between the different government departments, such as the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Interior and law enforcement in order to better protect Thailand’s online space and improve gambling harm education among the public.
Search engine platforms, most likely referring to companies like Google, have also been highlighted as potential partners to ringfence Thailand from illegal gambling.
Lastly, plans have also been introduced to create working groups that collect and analyse online data, which is to then be forwarded to social media platforms like TikTok and Meta for further assistance in taking down illegal platforms.
“Solving online gambling problems, including various illegal URLs, cannot be carried out by any [single] agency. But it requires cooperation from all sectors, especially the people, who are an important force in reporting information and clues,” the DE Ministry said.
“The government will bring such information to develop a surveillance system and coordinate cooperation with platforms and related agencies in order to prevent and solve online gambling problems quickly and effectively.”
Is Meta the right choice?
Relying on Meta to assist in the fight against illegal gambling, however, has a 50/50 chance of being a feasible strategy if the Big Tech company’s recent reputation is anything to go by.
On one hand, Meta has just entered a strategic pilot with Paf, a Nordic gambling operator, that will see both partners team up to fend off the black market.
Jesper Eliasson, Chief Business Development Officer at Paf, highlighted that the Facebook and Instagram owner has shown initiative in wanting to learn more about the illegal gambling sector, and that Paf will continuously feed Meta with information on black market operators and affiliates so that the tech giant can build up its database.
“I don’t know whether we will succeed, but we have taken the first steps. We are having good conversations together, and Meta does not want illegal operators on its platform. So we keep working on it and see how it goes,” Eliasson said.
At the same time, Meta has been summoned to court by Dutch online gambling trade body VNLOK, with the latter claiming that Meta has repeatedly failed to address concerns that illegal operators are using its platforms to attract Dutch consumers.
Whatever the optics on Meta’s reliability are, its role in the global fight against the black market is not to be overstated.
