Italy gets tough on illegal gambling activities

The Italian Agency of Customs and Monopolies (ADM) has shut down approximately 7,000 online gambling websites deemed to be in breach of national gambling laws.

The ADM figures were presented through an official economic & financial report presented by the Italian government as part of it September 2018 update.

The report details that over 10 million attempts to engage with unlicensed remote operators had been blocked by Italian law enforcement agencies.

Monitoring digital services, Italy’s customs and financial police units have been granted further rights to restrict access to unlicensed operators or websites promoting illegal gambling domains.

New restrictive provisions, grant Italian authorities the right to carry out spot checks and implement more stringent analyses of internet-service providers (ISPs).

The implementation of new ‘controlled actions’ has resulted in five Italian ISP providers being fined a total of €320,000 for failing to meet gambling restriction and monitoring requirements.

The Italian governments tougher stance on illegal gambling has not only been confined to online activities, as police carried out a number of video-lottery and slot machine inspections which have led to 42 sanctions imposed for +€300,000 and 33 gambling premises being suspended.

“The violations in the field are decreasing “thanks to the illegal circuit regularisation – achieved by two tax amnesties for unlicensed foreign bookmakers – as well as the intense control actions on the territory, that created a huge deterrent effect in a context where technological frauds are increasingly sophisticated and targeted” concludes the report.

Closing its update, the Italian government has called for the ADM to pursue further its tougher stance on unlicensed gambling operators.