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How to play Troll Hunters
An issue raised by Giannis Vasiliadis, director of WBAS, was the limited access to recipients’ banking information. This limited data can hint at suspicious activity but cannot conclusively verify gambling transactions.
Data Protection Commissioner Maria Christofidou said her office had reevaluated a 2022 legal opinion and now recognised a potential legal basis for more granular access to banking information.
Various MPs voiced concerns about the risk of privacy violations in accessing this data, and the potential social stigma around the information being shared.
How to play Troll Hunters
Madsen says investigators can also examine how sites appear from different jurisdictions. If a site is presented in a country’s local language, for example, that can indicate that the market is being targeted. The next question is whether the operator has the necessary licence.
The same intelligence can be useful to gambling companies and suppliers that want to monitor where their products are appearing. Madsen says Trace2Trace currently has a client that fits that description, although he cannot disclose its identity.
Madsen is clear that Trace2Trace does not shut websites down. Instead it tracks domains, identifies connections and documents changes so that regulators, enforcement authorities or other customers can use the information.
About Troll Hunters
The Commission’s intervention followed hot on the heels of the £600,000 regulatory settlement with QuinnBet, announced eight days earlier.
Its findings contained an all-too-familiar combination of ineffective systems, delayed interventions and inadequate source-of-funds controls. One customer placed approximately 4,800 bets in one day and 7,000 the next without being flagged. Another, whose payslips showed monthly earnings of about £2,000, deposited and lost £9,000 in four days.
“What is striking here is the level of activity that apparently failed to trigger effective intervention,” Williams says. “These were obvious indicators requiring further scrutiny, and it is difficult to understand why they did not result in more effective intervention.”
