KSA or Kansspelautoriteit, a Dutch gambling regulator has issues NetX Betting with a fine of up to €675,000 or £561,748 or $729,183. This is due to offering online gambling without a license on its Pferdewetten.de and Betbird.com domains. The penalty also covers NetX’s policy of fining inactive players after a certain period of time.
The KSA has handed out a slew of financial penalties. Recently, the KSA warned Winbet, the operator of Galaxyspins.com, Winnercasino1.bet, Superb1.bet, and Doctorspins.com, that it might have to pay up to €840,000 for offering unlicensed gambling products. The regulator also sent a similar communication to BlokDance recently for offering gambling activities through its bc.game and bcgame.lu domains.
The NetX case dates back to December 2022. This is when KSA first investigated the operator for illegal activity in the Netherlands. KSA found Dutch players were able to access and gamble through its Pferdewetten.de website.
Website visitors could bet on horse racing as well as trotting which KSA classes as games of chance. These are not restricted in the Netherlands without the relevant license. According to the site, it was only licensed in Malta.
In April of the following year, KSA reinvestigated the site. They have discovered Dutch players could still access the website. It also noted that the operator did not implement technical measures to prevent access for customers in the Netherlands.
In result to this, KSA issued NetX with a penalty payment order. They have informed the operator it must stop all activity in the country. Last September, NetX complied and shut down the website.
Nonetheless, KSA found players could still access the same site, open and account and gamble upon reinvestigation. Moreover, NetX operated another website, Betbird.com. It offered similar gambling options to Dutch users.
With a hearing taking place in early 2024, this led KSA to take further action.
