Sets up ‘Regulation on the provision of data for research into gambling addiction’
Kansspelautoriteit (KSA), the Netherlands Gambling Regulatory Authority has established the rules on the provision of data by online gaming providers for scientific research. The Regulation has been published in the Government Gazette.
The Gambling Act states that licensees for the provision of online games of chance are obliged to provide data for scientific research, if a research institution so requests. The Gaming Authority has drawn rules for this.
The new rules require that all operators must provide certain data for research purposes, in order to enhance the understanding of harmful gambling. “In practice, research institutions and the persons employed or associated with them who conduct research into gambling addiction do not always easily obtain the required research data. To facilitate this, the law provides that all online license holders are obliged, subject to conditions, to make anonymous data available to research institutions on request for research into gambling addiction.”
The ruling makes clear that licensees must “systematically register and analyse data” related to player behaviour and make an anonymised version of this data available to research institutions if requested. Also, that data that should include “internal and external signals pointing to excessive participation in licensed games of chance or risks of gambling addiction, and the player’s response to them”, login frequency, frequency of play, player age if they are under 24 and transaction history.
“This data is important for scientific research and the development of new scientific insights into problematic gaming behaviour, and the development of intervention methods tailored to the player to prevent the development from recreational to problematic gaming behaviour as much as possible,” the law adds.
Consultation
In October, the KSA consulted the draft version of the scheme. During the consultation, it became clear that various stakeholders have the impression that the underlying laws and regulations may create obstacles to the effective implementation of the Regulation. Specifically, this concerns the principle that anonymized data must be provided, instead of pseudonymized. The KSA, which attaches great importance to scientific research that can prevent gambling addiction, recognizes this problem. However, it does not see any possibilities within the existing legal frameworks to remove these obstacles. The Ministry of Justice and Security (responsible for gambling policy) is investigating in consultation with the KSA whether further regulations can be used to optimise this in the short or slightly longer term.
Supervision
The KSA will monitor whether the providers comply with the laws and regulations with regard to the new warning phrase, including the latest implementation date.
