Bet365 blacklisted in Belgium

The Belgian Gaming Commission (BGC) has added five more sites to its egaming blacklist, including bet365.com and www2.bwin.com.

Only one operator has been awarded a sports betting licence in the latest round of licensing, with Unibet now cleared to offer sports betting through its Unibet.be domain five months after submitting its application to the commission.

Two further companies, Blitz NV and Pavaber SA, have received B+ egaming licences (covering games) for their blitz.be and miragegames.be sites respectively.

Last month the BGC was challenged by bwin.party in the country’s high court over the London-listed operator’s inclusion on the blacklist for its bwin.com domain. The BGC won the case, with a spokesman for the commission having claimed in advance of the ruling that bwin.party was “Inciting Belgian citizens to commit crimes” by “Sending emails to players indicating on which other illegal websites of Bwin they still can gamble.”

eGaming Review has obtained access to an email sent by bwin.party to its Belgian players in May, which restates the operator’s belief that “The Belgian law on online gambling, in its current form, does not comply with EU law.” The email goes on to encourage players to visit the domains www2.bwin.com or bwin-client.com to access their accounts, despite the presence of a message on the bwin.com homepage that it is non-compliant with Belgian law.

A spokesperson for bet365 declined to comment when contacted by eGR.

The other three sites to be added to the blacklist today are www.maaslandgames.be, www.sjbet.at and www.7red.com, bringing the total up to 35.

Other regulated markets have since followed Belgium’s lead in taking measures to block unlicensed operators, with the Danish Gaming Authority last month ordering internet service provider 3 to block access to 12 sites including winner.com and titanpoker.com.

(photo courtesy of Mike Hammerton, under Creative Commons licence)