New Zealand Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden has introduced the Online Casino Gambling Bill to the House of Representatives.

“The Online Casino Gambling Bill will introduce a regulatory system for online gambling in New Zealand, which will prioritise harm minimisation, consumer protection, and tax collection,” said Ms van Velden.

Cabinet has previously agreed to introduce new legislation to regulate the online casino gambling market, which is currently unregulated in New Zealand. Key features of the Bill include:

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• Up to 15 licences for online casino gambling operators will be auctioned.

• Companies applying for a licence will need to provide detailed information to the regulator, including on their business plans for New Zealand.

• Licensed operators will be allowed to advertise, with restrictions.

• Unlicensed operators will be prohibited and fines up to $5 million may be applicable for breaking the law.

“The Bill will proceed to select committee later this year and New Zealanders will have the ability to have their say through the select committee process.”

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The introduction of the Bill meets action 21 on the Coalition Government’s Quarter Two Action Plan.

On June 26, the court at Frederiksberg ruled in favour of the Danish Gambling Authority to have 178 websites blocked that offered illegal gambling to Danes. That is the highest number of blocks made since 2012.

The Danish Gambling Authority monitors websites that offer gambling to Danes without a licence. The blocking of the sites is done through the court, which assesses whether they should be blocked, and now the court in Frederiksberg has ruled in favour of the Danish Gambling Authority and have ordered the Danish internet service providers to block 178 gambling sites.

In total, the Danish Gambling Authority has had 616 illegal gambling sites blocked since 2012.

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Record number of blocks

178 blocked websites are the highest number so far for a single blocking case since 2012. Previously, the Danish Gambling Authority conducted only one case a year in court to have the sites closed, but since 2024 the cases have been brought before the court twice annually.

“It is of course frustrating that illegal gambling sites continue to appear targeting Danes,” said Anders Dorph, Director of the Danish Gambling Authority.

“But I am very pleased that we have tools to find the sites and that we manage to get them blocked. In 2023, we took the initiative to have the sites blocked twice a year instead of once. This means that we can more quickly shut down access to sites that do not have a Danish licence and where consumers do not have the same protection as those gambling operators who have a licence from the Danish Gambling Authority.”

The Democratic Republic of Congo’s Ministry of Sports and Leisure announced the signing of a memorandum of understanding for a public-private partnership with Burundi’s East African General Trade Company (EAGT). This partnership aims to modernise the oversight of the gambling and sports betting sector, a rapidly expanding field in the country.

According to the Ministry, EAGT will implement a centralised digital monitoring system. This system will connect operators’ platforms to transmit real-time reports to the Congolese state. The initiative seeks to bolster sector transparency, enhance tax collection (especially the 10% tax on bettors’ winnings) and combat tax fraud.

While no specific timeline has been set for implementation, a pilot phase is planned for Kinshasa. An interministerial commission will rigorously supervise this pilot to ensure robust oversight by public authorities. EAGT will fully cover the project’s initial funding, with repayment staggered based on generated revenues, thereby avoiding any immediate pressure on state finances.

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This project is part of a broader push to regulate the sector. In 2023, during a Council of Ministers meeting, former Finance Minister Nicolas Kazadi revealed that 139 illegal operators were active in 2022, with no available data on their revenues. Tax collections that same year reached only one billion Congolese francs, a level deemed very low compared to the sector’s real potential.

Faced with this situation, the government had considered creating a regulatory authority equipped with a digital tracking system. Projections at the time suggested such a reform could generate over $100 million annually (280 billion Congolese francs at the current dollar value), solely from the tax applied to bettors’ stakes.

Burundi offers a successful example. In June 2024, N-Soft introduced a similar system there. According to the Director General of Burundi’s National Lottery, this system led to a dramatic 552% increase in the sector’s tax revenues.