Dutch Regulator Fines Chestoption €3.08 Million for Illegal Gambling Operations

[Fivestar4everMVP]

Government are not helping with the situation because the amount charged as fine is too much just for operating casino, what they don't know is that even if a casino is being regulated by them does not guarantee for safety that they won't scam or be trusted.

Everything that has to do with their regulation is only pointing to the fact that they wanted to tax them and make money from every operating platform, they use the threat of gambling being illegal and delight to make them consider being recognized by the regulatory body.

Well, lets get real here, we can't obviously blame the government for slamming a fine to the involved casino because from time imemorial, it's a law that every business operating within a country must have license allowing such business to operate in that country, doesn't matter whether the business is based on the country or based outside that country, this is what we all meet and has been part of the system all along and we all will possible leave it for the coming generations.

Now, speaking of how much the government charged the casino, you can't possibly conclude that the amount of much without first finding out how long that casino has been operating in the country without the necessary and required license, I believe that the amount charged is based on how long that casino has been offering their services to the people in Netherlands without licence allowing the casino to do so.

[AmoreJaz]

Is not it a common case? Any countries would be suing the site that operated illegally in your region. We have seen so many countries were also doing the same to the illegal prediction market. So it's clear when an illegal casino operated in the country that didn't get an approval to them. They might be sued and charged penalty by the government in the area they operated with.

So i don't think they don't aware with the consequence, though they operated ilegally. If they were really committing with their service, they might try to acquire the license in the country that they want to operate.

It's easy to fix this by paying the fine, then apply for the license.

If the site wants to operate legally, they should look after their players as well and their whereabouts. Because without those permits, they are considered running illegally and their players are at risk. They may have their license but it is only good for certain jurisdictions. If they want to expand their business, it means, they should be willing to file their legalities to other areas that they have patrons or players.

[Ayers]

Is not it a common case? Any countries would be suing the site that operated illegally in your region. We have seen so many countries were also doing the same to the illegal prediction market. So it's clear when an illegal casino operated in the country that didn't get an approval to them. They might be sued and charged penalty by the government in the area they operated with.
So i don't think they don't aware with the consequence, though they operated ilegally. If they were really committing with their service, they might try to acquire the license in the country that they want to operate.
It's easy to fix this by paying the fine, then apply for the license.

If the site wants to operate legally, they should look after their players as well and their whereabouts. Because without those permits, they are considered running illegally and their players are at risk. They may have their license but it is only good for certain jurisdictions.

Vave had already been fined once before. And they did not pay it afaik. So the same thing can be expected this time too. Many offshore operator even though they have the Netherlands on restricted list, still accept traffic due to VPN or weak geo blocks. In fact to avoid sich unnecessary hassles everyone should use platform that have a good record in terms of payment and clearly maintain rule. To be honest it is very tough to collect all these fines practically due to international borders

[AVE5]

Government are not helping with the situation because the amount charged as fine is too much just for operating casino, what they don't know is that even if a casino is being regulated by them does not guarantee for safety that they won't scam or be trusted.

Everything that has to do with their regulation is only pointing to the fact that they wanted to tax them and make money from every operating platform, they use the threat of gambling being illegal and delight to make them consider being recognized by the regulatory body.

Don't mind those authorities of the governments, they're supposed to be an intermediary between the casino's and the bettors but to no avail, instead they're just concerned of what they'd benefit by taxing the casino's.
They're even supposed to set up a moderating gambling systems to conduct gamblers approaches but all that has become non of their concerns instead, they even collaborates with the casino's with the so legal justice of making away with players money by forfeit and even when a gambler is going astray or being cheated by the casino the government won't care.
They're just values to the community members.

[acroman08]

This could be similar to prediction markets getting sued by different countries, but the question is, can they really go after the operators of this company?

Because we are talking about a serious amount of money here, if they will fine them then they have to make sure they can collect it, or if they will sue, where would they sue the casino when it does not acquire a license and its presence is just online?

I am wondering if ICC or whatever type of court similar to that in the middle would help with this kind of issue.

They can't really physically pursue them if the casino is offshore/located in another country, so all the government can do is order them to pay, and if they don't comply, the government will just block the casino from the country.  As for the ICC, I don't think they involve themselves with cases like this.

Their signature campaign is on and off, the reason you don’t see them is probably because you are not looking at the right board.

You can find their signature here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5584512.0

Thanks, and yeah, I was looking at the "services" board, so I only saw their review contest.

About other casinos, I am wondering why only these casinos are being penalized, I believe there are also other offshore casinos that accept users from this country, so what is this, are they only targeting few companies?

Maybe they are still investigating those other casinos and would only go after them if they have enough evidence.

[Darker45]

Why would it be alarming if the same is imposed on other companies? On the contrary, it should be imposed on all companies operating illegally.

What's actually alarming is the opposite--if companies from all over the world can easily operate within a jurisdiction without obtaining a license. That would be disadvantageous not only to the government because they're not paying taxes but also to the users for being exposed to the risks of using unregistered and unregulated gambling services.

[$crypto$]

I don't think they will be charged by Dutch regulator if they were mentioning Netherland to be one of restricted country.

I do not know if the gambling site mentioned Netherlands to be a restricted company before I posted that, but I have later check it and see that Netherlands is part of the restricted countries according or the gambling site terms of service which is this but which I have seen on all gambling sites that I habe read their terms of service before.

Does Vave casino not block IPs from dutch? We know that the country is restricted there should be a pop-up telling Dutch citizens not to play, maybe Dutch citizens won't be able to play unless they use a VPN.

So, the reason will not be that Netherlands is part of the restricted countries, it is because Dutch government do not permit the gambling site to offer gambling products and services to their people but the gambling site is offering the gambling products and services to their citizens. You can also see it in a quote on the topic.

The KSA found that Costa Rica-based Chestoption Sociedad de Responsabilidad Limitada offered unlicensed gambling to Dutch players.

This means that this casino is openly offering products to Dutch citizens but in the end it was caught by the government there and the casino was fined, this could be said to be a kind of violation of the casino's own rules if it really offers products directly.

[Alex077]

From what Charles-Tim shared, it looks like any casinos that acquired the same license as vave.com and allow gamblers from the Netherlands would probably face the same issue as vave.com.

This could be similar to prediction markets getting sued by different countries, but the question is, can they really go after the operators of this company?

Because we are talking about a serious amount of money here, if they will fine them then they have to make sure they can collect it, or if they will sue, where would they sue the casino when it does not acquire a license and its presence is just online?

I am wondering if ICC or whatever type of court similar to that in the middle would help with this kind of issue.

You ask a very good question, bro. Collecting such huge fines will be a very difficult task even from Costa Rica based operators. It can only be done through international cooperation. Besides, this kind of work will never be practical. The government will always want their share of taxes and control. In fact it is possible to slightly disrupt their operations by strictly blocking payment methods. But in reality these offshore crypto casinos will continue to operate, there is no way to completely shut them down. From this incident it is now clear that there is no point in relying on regulators. Rather gamblers should manage their own risks. These problems can be avoided by using reputable and long standing sites like Bitz, stake, Duelbits etc,,,

[Synchronice]

Just want to share this news since I find it interesting, there is a casino that has its ANN thread in the forum and is even running a signature campaign actively, and it was included in the news.

So here is the news, I am talking about Vave.com as you can read.

But it is not really the site that I am concerned about, it is more about other casinos that are operating offshore and do not have a license in a certain country but still allow gamblers from that country to gamble. As per record, the country has fined them millions, so what would happen to other casinos that acquired a license from the same provider, as I believe they are running a similar operation.

https://focusgn.com/chestoption-fined-e3-08-million-for-illegal-gambling-offer-targeting-dutch-players

The KSA found that Costa Rica-based Chestoption Sociedad de Responsabilidad Limitada offered unlicensed gambling to Dutch players.

The Netherlands.- The Dutch gambling regulator Kansspelautoriteit (KSA) has issued a fine of €3.08m against Chestoption Sociedad de Responsabilidad Limitada, a company based in Costa Rica. The KSA says Chestoption allowed Dutch players to gamble on its websites Vave.com, Vave-luck.com, and 67evav55.com, which do not have licences to offer gambling in the Netherlands.

And this is more alarming if it will be imposed on other companies.
That is a massive amount, the fact that it has risen that high maybe means the government has not really forced them to pay yet.

In March, the KSA issued a record fine of €24m for alleged repeated breaches of regulations against Novatech for allowing Dutch players to gamble on its websites Qbet.com and 55Bet.com, which do not have licences to offer gambling in the Netherlands.

How did they came to a conclusion that the website allowed players from Netherlands to allow Dutch players to gamble on its website? Were users in Netherlands complaining about Vave to local police or did Netherands Authorities made a recorded attempt of registering on the website and using the products of Vave.com?
By the way, this casino barely pays $10 to its signature campaign participants and now has to pay 3 million in fines, it's funny. I think that the owner must be greedy for that.

By the way, these restrictions are stupid. We all know that people from all over the world gamble on crypto casinos, despite restrictions. It's impossible to restrict things online. These casinos have multiple languages on their website, like Spanish, Italian, German, French, Russian, Portuguese and so on. These aren't for people from Costa Rica, these are definitely for people from Germany, France, Italy, Spain and so on.

[Charles-Tim]

Does Vave casino not block IPs from dutch? We know that the country is restricted there should be a pop-up telling Dutch citizens not to play, maybe Dutch citizens won't be able to play unless they use a VPN.

How did they came to a conclusion that the website allowed players from Netherlands to allow Dutch players to gamble on its website? Wer

This will be what that happened. There are some sites that will restrict certain countries on their terms of service, but they will not block the people from the country that are visiting the gambling sites. If a gambling sites do that, it is normal for the country to file a lawsuit against such gambling site.

[DubemIfedigbo001]

So why not ban them from the start, it is one of the shady sides of casinos, they make their own rules then they just implement it whenever they want to avoid paying.

It is not their duty to ban them from playing, the users have seen in the T&C that they are not allowed to use the service and if they go ahead to use it, then they are breaking the casino laws. If the country wants to enforce it themselves, they should block access to those casinos from their country. I don't even see the reason for the casino to pay any fine if at all they have Dutch listed as a restricted country in their T&C.

3.6. Players from Belarus, Curacao, Estonia, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, United Kingdom , United States of America, Cyprus, France, Turkey, Netherlands are prohibited from playing real money wagering games at Vave. The Casino cannot guarantee successful processing of withdrawals or refunds if the player breaches this Restricted Countries policy. Also please note that players from Canada are not allowed to play NYX (NextGen) games.

I see this from their Terms and conditions

[Dr.Bitcoin_Strange]

Before some of these offshore casinos will allow their website to some countries, they already make research to know the rules and regulations in that country because they already know that if they don't do such findings and they allow their website in some country that have a very tight regulations, it will affect their business when the country takes legal action against them. I don't know if these casinos that were mentioned on that news have ban on users from Dutch, if they do, that means, they could defend themselves from this fine.

[stadus]

Before some of these offshore casinos will allow their website to some countries, they already make research to know the rules and regulations in that country because they already know that if they don't do such findings and they allow their website in some country that have a very tight regulations, it will affect their business when the country takes legal action against them. I don't know if these casinos that were mentioned on that news have ban on users from Dutch, if they do, that means, they could defend themselves from this fine.

The word “when” is very unpredictable, but for them to recognize the risk, they already consider that it is possible a country could file a case against them.

But what is certain is that they know if such country could really make an impact against their business.
Because it is easy to file a case, but that case is only filed inside their country, and the casinos will be safe as long as they will not operate in that country.