False addresses, fake reviews and media sabotage - findings show length to which illegal operators are going to deceive punters

Black market operators and affiliates are hijacking website domains, curating false reviews and engaging with media and fanzine publications in an escalation of their attempts to reach vulnerable customers.

An investigation by the Racing Post has uncovered tens of websites promoting black market casino and betting websites billed as "not on Gamstop" – the self-exclusion scheme for people with gambling problems – that are disguised by misleading website addresses or that are redirecting people to sites not related to the domain, a process known as link jacking.

The findings follow on from the Racing Post’s Big Punting Survey of nearly 10,000 punters which indicated an increased use of the black market, with more than one in three high-staking bettors – those reporting an average stake of £1,000 or more – admitting to using such operations in the last year.

Using variations of the search term ‘not on Gamstop betting’, websites promoting illegal gambling operators were available through a number of addresses including ones purporting to be associated with a Welsh football club, a fish and chip shop in Wantage, an organisation helping women suffering from domestic violence in Bristol, and a support service for unpaid carers in the Scottish Highlands. 

The organisations had no links to black market betting, with the URLs having been taken over after the businesses closed or moved on to new domains.

'Non-Gamstop' casinos were also advertising and being promoted on a Liverpool Football Club fan website and on media websites dedicated to rugby union and non-league football.

The Rugby Paper and The Non League Paper offered links to non-Gamstop websites on their homepages and in blog postings. Both publications are owned by Greenways Publishing and, in marketing material produced by the company, are said to get a combined 1.68 million unique website visitors a year.

A website for the defunct football side Bangor City was referring people to non-Gamstop operators

Contacted by the Racing Post, Sam Emery, Greenways head of sales, said the group had not been aware of the links, adding: “These links have been deleted and will not [be] reappearing on our websites.” Emery did not respond to additional questions on how the links had come to be on the websites in the first place.

Links to non-Gamstop casinos also featured prominently on The Liverpool Way website, which lists its membership at 8,895 and has nearly 95,000 followers on X. It also produces regular podcasts. The publication did not respond to a request for comment.

Black market operators have also begun curating favourable reviews on Trustpilot, the popular consumer reviews website. Reviewers emphasise the ease of depositing and withdrawing funds, the bonuses on offer to new customers, and the lack of regulation and oversight. The reviews have resulted in ‘high trust’ scores for the websites.

False reviews from black market operators have been found on Trustpilot

The Gambling Commission said the moves by black market firms were part of a “new trend” aimed at avoiding detection and extended beyond websites to downloadable apps masquerading as games.

A spokesperson said: “We appear to be seeing a new trend where unlicensed operators are using deceptive URLs or app names in an attempt to avoid detection. But we deal with these in the same way as we deal with other unlicensed sites – when we learn of their existence we take action.

“Since the start of April our team has issued more than 770 cease-and-desist and disruption notices. This includes 262 cease-and-desists issued to operators and 205 to advertisers.  

“Over that same period the commission has referred more than 102,000 URLs to Google with 64,000 of these removed by the search engine, and more than 260 websites taken down. This is more than a tenfold increase in URL takedowns in comparison to the whole of 2023 to 2024.”

The Gambling Commission is also in line to receive greater power to move against illegal operators as part of the Crime and Policing Bill that was introduced to parliament last week.

Baroness Fiona Twycross said the bill was “an important step in equipping the commission to tackle the illegal market and protect legitimate businesses"

In her speech at the Betting And Gaming Council’s annual meeting last week, gambling minister Baroness Twycross said the bill was “an important step in equipping the commission to tackle the illegal market and protect legitimate businesses”.

This was also emphasised by GamStop, and a spokesperson said: “We are in regular monthly contact with the Gambling Commission’s intelligence and enforcement team, and we have seen encouraging progress in the successful removal of sites and promotion of these sites, following cease-and-desist requests by the regulator. In addition, Meta is removing advertising we are reporting to them, especially if it contains our IP.

“We recognise there is more work to do to remove all advertising of casinos bypassing GamStop and from preventing the advertising in the first place, which targets vulnerable consumers who want to protect themselves from gambling harm. More than 550,000 consumers have registered for self-exclusion since GamStop’s inception in 2018.

“We welcome the Crime and Policing Bill which will give the Gambling Commission greater powers to act swiftly to take down IP addresses and domain names associated with illegal websites.”

Read more here on the Big Punting Survey

We asked 10,000 punters about affordability checks and the black market. What you told us is alarming 

'Everyone is losing out' - racing figures fear for sport in light of survey's findings over growth of black market 

Failure to act on black market 'would be an act of vandalism' in wake of Big Punting Survey findings 

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