SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
Twitch has updated its ‘community guidelines’, informing streamers that it will no longer allow the promotion or sponsorship of skin gambling sites on its live streaming platform.
The decision sees Twitch continue to tighten rules on promoting gambling-related content, which saw the company initially revise its marketing rules last summer in light of streamers promoting unlicensed casino content.
Updating its community guidelines, under the category of ‘Prohibited Gambling Content FAQs’ – Twitch answered the question of “Is sponsorship of skin gambling, such as CS:GO allowed?”
The live-streaming giant responded: “No promotion or sponsorship of Skin Gambling is allowed under our policy”.
Skin Gambling sites are third-party websites which allow players to exchange or wager their virtual goods won or collected on video games such as Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO), popular with esports audiences.
Initiating its guidelines review in 2022, Twitch announced that it would no longer allow link referrals to casino or sportsbook platforms.
The tech giant had faced pressure to ban casino promotions, following widespread criticism of streamers Tyler ‘Trainwreck‘ Niknam and Adin Ross playing and promoting the crypto online casino of Stake.com, to their communities.
Esports observers noted that uncertainties remain regarding Twitch’s ban on skin gambling sites. Organizations such as G2 Esports, who recently announced a partnership with a site that provides skin gambling services, CSGORoll, could face difficulties due to the updated rules.
