EGBA publishes anti-money laundering guidelines for European online gambling operators
Illegal money laundering is one of the biggest threats to gambling worldwide. The European Gaming and Betting Association (EGBA) has published recommendations to strengthen the efforts of European online operators in the fight against money laundering. On Tuesday, the EGBA presented its Anti-Money Laundering Guidelines.
Improved standards to combat money laundering
The EGBA Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing Guidelines contain a set of standards to be applied by online gambling operators in the EU. According to the association, the goal is to complement and strengthen existing anti-money laundering measures. In addition, the specifications were developed taking into account the relevant EU regulations that will soon be implemented.
The EGBA Anti-Money Laundering Recommendations contain specifications in the following areas:
- Conducting customer and business risk assessments
- Compliance with customer due diligence and improvement of existing processes
- Requirements for reporting suspicious transactions
- Relationship between anti-money laundering and safe gambling
- Requirements for document storage
The published guidelines are only a preliminary version. To ensure that the latest operating instructions are incorporated into the rules, the EGBA is asking its members to send feedback by mid-October 2022. These should then be incorporated into the final guidelines to be published by the EGBA at a later date.
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Reporting obligations for gambling providers
To make sure that the guidelines serve their purpose, the EGBA requires its members to submit annual status reports. In them, online providers must summarize their progress in implementing the guidelines. To keep them in line with the latest industry practices, they may be adjusted or changed in the future.
Katerina Hartmann, EGBA Director of Legal and Regulatory Affairs, explained:
"We are pleased to present the first pan-European industry-wide anti-money laundering standards for the European online gambling sector. Preventing the use of online gambling to conceal the proceeds of crime is an important challenge for gambling operators in Europe, but there is currently very little industry-specific guidance to assist operators in their compliance efforts."
The Association hopes that the guidelines will fill this gap and provide a solid basis for the gaming industry to achieve the highest possible standards of compliance with anti-money laundering requirements.
At the same time, the EGBA has invited other online gambling companies that are not members of the association to join its initiative to better combat money laundering. The coming years will show how much the guidelines will help reduce crime in this area.
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