British bookmakers’ anti-money laundering standards are slipping according to the Gambling Commission, which has taken aim at the over-use of AI by operators.
Failure to comply with AML standards has led to some hefty enforcement actions in the past, with the Commission charging Entain and William Hill record penalties of £17m and £19.2m for AML and social responsibility failures in 2022 and 2023.
John Pierce, the Commission’s Director of Enforcement, addressed stakeholders at the Gambling Anti-Money Laundering Group (GAMLG) Annual Conference yesterday, and took note of the emerging use of AI and algorithms used as AML controls and diligence by betting licences.
“We aren’t ideologically against the use of new technology in your processes,” he said.
“But you need to be sure they are doing what is required and the evidence we’ve seen so far is too often they simply aren’t delivering.
“So if your business is considering this type of approach, make sure it’s delivering compliance before you launch it.”
AI’s use for AML is becoming more common in high-risk sectors, such as financial services and betting, to fulfil compliance duties. Betting companies were quick to follow, with major players like Flutter Entertainment and Entain leveraging the tech across brand portfolios.
The technology can be used to analyse huge swathes of customer transaction data to search for anomalies. AI bots and algorithms are also utilised to write this data into Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs).
For firms like Flutter Entertainment, which recorded over 14 million average monthly players across its UK brands (Sky Bet, Paddy Power, Betfair, Tombola etc) in Q1 2026 alone, the tech is viewed as a significant compliance enabler and strategic cost control
While the Commission is clearly aware of this, it is also very wary that operators may become overreliant on the tech and its algorithms that should not be viewed as an all-embracing protection.
If operators want to avoid enforcement actions from a regulator which has shown it is not adverse to harsh action, they’d better make sure their AI strategy is watertight.
Get serious on AML, says Commission
Aside from AI, the Gambling Commission has identified other areas operators are falling short in. Pierce highlighted instances where Personal management Licence (PML) holders “did not have sufficient oversight over AML controls”.
A PML is an individual licence held by people working at licensed gambling operators whose responsibilities encompass AML. This includes people with oversight of, among other areas:
- Management and direction of business and affairs
- Strategy and delivery of gambling operations
- Financial planning, control and budgeting
- Marketing and commercial development
- Regulatory compliance
“I think it’s fair to say that we have been getting tougher on PMLs at the Commission in recent years and this ought to be a wake up call to anyone with a PML to make sure you are on top of this stuff,” Pierce said.
“Further to this, we are seeing some operators not taking a risk-based approach when it comes to their internal risk assessment against money laundering and terrorist financing.
“That or they are not considering all risks associated with their customers and business. Either way, this is something else to check when you get back to your desks tomorrow.”
According to Pierce, the Commission continues to regularly come across cases of operators failing on due diligence and AML. This includes case where:
- Operators have failed to have sufficient due diligence over third-party business relationships, including white label deals.
- Record keeping, such as recording of rational and decision making, has not been up to scratch.
- Over-reliance on financial thresholds. Pierce asserted that this does not adequately risk profile customers before thresholds are reached.
The regulatory environment around UK gambling has tightened over the past years. The April 2023 White Paper following the three-year review of the 2005 Gambling Act led to a lot of changes for the licensed industry.
This included the implementation of dreaded ‘affordability checks’. The Commission introduced the lighter-touch version of these, Vulnerability Checks, in February 2024, but the more stringent version, Financial Risk Assessments (FRAs), are still yet to be adopted, having come up against a huge amount of industry pushback.
With this in mind, the Commission seems very aware that asking customers for financial documents can be ‘painful’, as Pierce put it yesterday. However, the regulator has also made it clear that it is not messing about when it comes to AML.
The Commission has been tightening its oversight of B2B deals and white label partnerships in recent years.
The latter is perhaps best seen by the surrender of TGP Europe’s licence last year, bringing an end to the licensed activities of a variety of offshore companies, many of which were using the licence to maintain marketing deals with Premier League clubs.
As the industry continues to navigate regulatory changes, a heavier tax burden, and the continuing development of technologies like AI, operators will need to make sure AML is on top form if they want to avoid the fates that befell Entain and William Hill in 2022/23, and which has fallen on many others in the years since.
The Commission will publish a full AML risk assessment in July 2026.
