Spillemyndigheden launches a whistleblower scheme as a new weapon in its battle against the use of the gambling industry as a money laundering tool
The Danish Gambling Authority, Spillemyndigheden, announced on Thursday the official launch of a whistleblower program that aims to combat money laundering within the nation’s regulated gambling industry.
The new scheme enables people employed at locally licensed gambling operators to report violations or potential violations of Denmark’s anti-money laundering laws taking place at their companies.
To help gambling employees reports such violations or suspected violations, Spillemyndigheden has added a contact form that can be found under the ‘Contact’ menu on its official website. A person employed in the local gambling industry can use the form to send “an anonymous, encrypted report” to the regulator.
In a message on its website, the Danish Gambling Authority said on Thursday that it would conduct a legal assessment of each and every report it receives to determine what additional actions need to be taken.
News about the Danish regulator’s new anti-money laundering measure arrive shortly after its UK counterpart, the UK Gambling Commission, slapped a £4.5 million fine on four of its licensees for repeated failures to implement effective measures for the prevention of money laundering. InTouch Games Limited, Betit Operations Limited, MT Secure Trade, and BestBet Limited were the four companies to face the latest wave of regulatory action unleashed by the UK gambling regulator.
Danish Gambling Authority Steps Up Anti-Money Laundering Measures
The Danish Gambling Authority is the regulator tasked with overseeing how anti-money laundering tools and safeguards are implemented in the gambling industry. The regulator supervises online and land-based betting and online and land-based casino operators that provide their services in the country or are established in the country but provide their services outside Denmark, and monitors their operations closely to detect any potential violations of the nation’s Anti-Money Laundering Act.
In its annual report for 2018, Spillemyndigheden said that it has initiated two additional projects to strengthen its monitoring policies in relation to the potential use of the gambling industry for money laundering and terrorism financing. The first project involves collecting organizational data from locally licensed online gambling companies with the purpose of identifying how individual license holders “fulfill their responsibilities to combat money laundering.”
The second project has to do with the provision of land-based services and what tools and safeguards operators of retail betting facilities and brick-and-mortar casinos have implemented to prevent money laundering and other financial crimes. Both projects are expected to be completed this year and are part of Denmark’s broader strategy to ramp up its battle against money laundering and the use of various sectors, including gambling, to facilitate financial crimes on the territory of the country.
Follow us on Facebook and Twitter to stay up to date on the day’s top casino news stories.
