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Gambless unveils new DHYP awareness campaign

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Gambling harm solution platform Gambless announces today the launch of a new “Don’t Hide Your Pain” (DHYP) awareness campaign against gambling addiction.

The launch of the campaign coincides with the start of the Safer Gambling Week, an initiative brought forward by the Betting and Gaming Council and aimed at promoting safer gambling in the UK and Ireland.

The DHYP campaign will last approx. three months and will cover various aspects of gambling, highlighting the risks involved in such activity.

The campaign aims to prevent gambling harm, conveying its message mainly to younger individuals in Britain and Italy. The two countries, despite being among the first markets to regulate online gambling, share staggering low levels of awareness.

In the UK, it’s estimated that only between 0.6 and 3% of problem gamblers receive treatment. Similar percentages are seen in Italy, where of the 1,300,000 estimated pathological gamblers, only about 12,000 get help each year.

The campaign messages focus on the fact that one does not need to be a problem gambler to suffer gambling harm, thus resonating with a larger audience.

The first batch of promo assets will begin circulating on various social media starting this weekend, putting the spotlight on some of the clear signs of problematic gambling behaviour to look out for, and will be accompanied by the #dhyp hashtag.

Below some comments on the initiative from Gambless CEO, Maurizio Savino:

 

“Why the need of an awareness campaign?

A recent report from the National Gambling Treatment Service confirmed that the awareness on problem gambling in the UK is still very low. It’s estimated that less than 3% of all pathological gamblers receive help. That’s an extremely low figure, even compared to that of alcohol abusers who seek help (15-25%).

Making awareness campaigns about gambling addiction is not easy. It’s a delicate topic and we have seen recently how campaigns can easily face criticisms. However, there is a dire need to do more.

 

“Why borrowing a famous meme’s expression?”

We don’t have the resources of the big charities out there. So, with our small budget, we had to be creative.

Memes are one of the greatest ways of communication of our times. One may dismiss them as silly or shallow – a theory I strongly disagree with. In my opinion memes can be very deep and carry important meanings that one can relate to, stop and think for a couple of seconds. They can raise much more awareness than a distracting storyline.

Memes are also extremely popular among young adults, which are one of the categories at higher risk of gambling harm as well.

 

“What does Gambless do?”

Gambless is a mobile application, the first to provide psychological support to problem gamblers with an innovative and holistic approach on mental health.

Available both on Google Play and App Store, it provides several self-help tools and it offers a number of supportive programs specifically designed by our team of expert psychologists, using various techniques including CBT and Gestalt psychology.

Reception from users has been overwhelming so far. We saw more than 1,000 downloads in just two months since launch, with an upward trend. At current rates we welcome about 1 new gambler each hour through our virtual doors, which are open 24/7.

If these numbers might seem small, one must consider that the UK National Gambling Treatment services help about 9,000 individuals per year, with first appointment waiting times being even over of 104 days for residential treatment. Therefore, such remote services must be taken seriously as an immediate alternative and complementary way of support.

Gambless has the ability to reach many more people in need, with no scalability issues whatsoever. With a bit more awareness and cooperation from the industry, we could really make a difference in the lives of vulnerable individuals.

 

“What’s in store for 2021?”

We want to help as many problem gamblers as possible, so we will continue to raise awareness on the topic, we plan to rollout new languages, and we hope to cooperate with gambling firms and regulators in order to make gambling truly safer.

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Acquisitions/Merger

THE VISUALIZE GROUP COMPLETES ACQUISITION OF BMM TESTLABS

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FIRST-EVER PRIVATE EQUITY ACQUISITION IN THE NORTH AMERICAN REGULATED GAMING TESTING AND INSPECTION MARKET

Transaction Receives Required Regulatory Approvals Across Multiple Global Jurisdictions

The Visualize Group (“Visualize”), a private investment firm focused on concentrated investing in mission-critical, services-based companies, announced the completion of its acquisition of BMM Testlabs (“BMM”), the longest established and most experienced leader in testing, inspection, compliance, and certification (“TICC”) services for the regulated global gaming industry. The transaction has received required regulatory approvals across multiple global jurisdictions, underscoring the confidence of gaming regulators worldwide in this partnership. Financial terms were not disclosed. The transaction represents the first-ever control acquisition of a major regulated gaming testing laboratory, marking the opening of a market that has been structurally inaccessible to institutional capital.

Headquartered in Las Vegas, Nevada, and founded in 1981, BMM serves gaming product suppliers, operators, and regulators across six continents, employing more than 700 professionals in 16 offices worldwide and holding more than 700 regulatory and related business licenses — one of the broadest regulatory footprints of any organization in the gaming industry.

The transaction represents a structural first: no major gaming testing laboratory in North America has ever been acquired by a private equity sponsor. For decades, the regulatory complexity of the TICC market — requiring hundreds of individual licenses across dozens of jurisdictions — has insulated these businesses from institutional ownership. The successful navigation of that complexity, culminating in regulatory approvals across multiple jurisdictions, establishes BMM as the first institutionally owned platform in the space and positions it as the natural acquirer of choice as consolidation accelerates.

Martin Storm, President and Chief Executive Officer of BMM Testlabs, said, “Today marks the beginning of an exciting and ambitious new chapter for BMM. Gaming regulators across the globe have endorsed this partnership through their approvals, and I am proud of the trust we have built over more than four decades. With Visualize’s support, we can now invest aggressively in our people, our technology, and our global footprint in ways that were not previously possible. Our customers should expect faster turnaround times, expanded jurisdictional coverage, deeper technical capabilities, and a level of service and partnership that no other testing laboratory in the world can match. We are building the definitive platform for gaming compliance, and we are just getting started.”

C. C. Melvin Ike, Founder and Managing Partner of Visualize, said, “We built Visualize to own irreplaceable businesses in markets where regulatory complexity creates durable, defensible demand. BMM is a clear expression of this thesis. The regulated gaming industry generates more than $600 billion in annual gross gaming revenue globally, and its TICC infrastructure — the certification and compliance layer that every product must pass through before it can reach market — is structurally underpenetrated by institutional capital. BMM’s multi-decade track record of regulatory trust and an irreplaceable stable of licenses represent a moat that would take a new entrant decades and significant capital to replicate. We look forward to backing the entire BMM team, supporting the customers that drive the industry, and preserving the trust of the regulators that protect it.

Advisors

Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP and Greenberg Traurig acted as legal and regulatory counsel, respectively, to Visualize. Gadens, BDO, and Cooper Levenson acted as legal, financial and regulatory counsel to BMM Testlabs.

The post THE VISUALIZE GROUP COMPLETES ACQUISITION OF BMM TESTLABS appeared first on Americas iGaming & Sports Betting News.

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SCCG Partners with The Vegas Walk Method® to Advance Player Empowerment and Sustainable Gaming Infrastructure Across Tribal and Commercial Markets

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SCCG Management, a global advisory firm specializing in gaming, sports betting, iGaming, and emerging regulatory innovation, today announced a strategic partnership with The Vegas Walk Method®, a behavioral framework designed to promote player empowerment and sustainable engagement within high-volatility gaming environments.

Through this partnership, SCCG will support the strategic positioning, enterprise introductions, and market expansion of The Vegas Walk Method® across tribal and commercial gaming operators. The collaboration focuses on integrating the method as a player sovereignty-aligned infrastructure layer that empowers players to maintain intentional engagement while supporting operators in meeting evolving responsible gaming and regulatory objectives.

The Vegas Walk Method® is a patent-pending, trauma-aware framework built around a structured, player-defined containment approach that operates alongside an operator’s existing customer journey model. Unlike abstinence-based models, the method does not monitor or observe player behavior in-session. Instead, it provides tools that help players maintain psychological stability, develop volatility awareness, and define personal session boundaries, , and while continuing to participate in recreational gaming.

“The industry conversation around responsible gaming is evolving,” said Stephen Crystal, Founder and CEO of SCCG Management. “Operators, particularly in tribal markets, are increasingly focused on long-term sustainability, player empowerment, and proactive regulatory leadership. The Vegas Walk Method® provides a framework that aligns with those priorities by placing agency in the hands of the player while supporting operators with measurable, auditable outcomes. We believe this represents an important evolution in how the industry approaches sustainable engagement.”

Originally developed with operator constraints in mind, The Vegas Walk Method® is deployable through software at scale and designed to integrate seamlessly within existing operational environments. The framework surfaces structured insights for reporting and evaluation while maintaining a “zero-observation” model that respects player autonomy. It is jurisdiction-agnostic and adaptable across physical casinos, online gaming environments, and emerging digital verticals.

Central to the The Vegas Walk Method® is the concept of structured session containment, volatility awareness, and repeatable practices that build consistency across sessions. By encouraging intentional engagement and mitigating “flow state” burnout, the framework aims to support sustainable revenue models that reduce churn while protecting long-term guest relationships. For tribal operators in particular, the method aligns with player sovereignty principles and community-first mandates by reinforcing personal self-governance and sustainable play.

The partnership also positions The Vegas Walk Method® as a proactive infrastructure solution within broader regulatory and innovation discussions. As the gaming industry continues to expand into new digital formats, including prediction markets and other high-frequency engagement environments, the underlying concept offers potential application beyond traditional casino floors.

“Stephen and the team at SCCG have spent decades at the forefront of gaming innovation, and they understand instinctively that player empowerment and operator performance aren’t in tension — they’re the same goal. This partnership lets us bring The Vegas Walk Method® to the operators who are ready to lead on sustainable engagement, not just respond to regulatory pressure,” said Matthew Reynolds, Inventor & CEO of The Vegas Walk Method®  As regulatory scrutiny and public expectations continue to evolve, SCCG and The Vegas Walk Method® will work together to introduce a player sovereignty-first, empowerment-driven approach to responsible gaming that balances operator performance with long-term player wellbeing.

The post SCCG Partners with The Vegas Walk Method® to Advance Player Empowerment and Sustainable Gaming Infrastructure Across Tribal and Commercial Markets appeared first on Americas iGaming & Sports Betting News.

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Despite AI’s Rise, Fraud Teams Keep Growing — SEON 2026 Report

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SEON, the command centre for immediate Fraud Prevention and AML Compliance, has unveiled AI Reality Check: 2026 Fraud & AML Leaders Report, the second iteration of its sector research, derived from a worldwide survey of 1,010 leaders in fraud, risk, and compliance spanning payments, fintech, financial services, retail, eCommerce, and gaming.

The figures reveal an unforeseen narrative: AI is ubiquitous, yet operations are not becoming easier to manage. Currently, 98% of organizations utilize AI in fraud and AML processes, with 95% expressing confidence in its effectiveness; meanwhile, headcount plans rose from 88% to 94% year-over-year, and 83% anticipate budget increases in 2026.

Complexity Is Surpassing Automation

AI has not lessened the workload — it has revealed the extent of work that has always existed. Fraud losses are increasingly approaching revenue growth, threats are advancing more rapidly, and disjointed systems restrict the true potential of AI at scale. Key year-over-year shift:​

Leadership’s confidence in their teams’ performance is lagging. The number of leaders who disagreed with the statement, “fraud losses are growing faster than revenue,”​ dropped by almost 40% from the previous year

 

Inside the Numbers:​

AI is baseline, not experimental​

  • 98% already integrate AI into daily workflows (only 2% still planning)​
  • 95% are confident AI can detect and prevent fraud (52% very confident)​
  • Top use case: AI/ML for transaction monitoring (30%)​

Fraud and AML investment keeps climbing​

  • 83% expect fraud/AML budgets to increase in 2026​
  • 94% plan to add at least one full-time hire (up from 88% in 2025)​
  • 85% plan to add a vendor, 49% plan to replace one​

Fragmentation is the bottleneck​

  • 95% claim “some integration” between fraud and AML systems​
  • Only 47% run fully integrated workflows; the rest rely on partial connections​
  • 80% say getting a unified view of data is challenging​

For many, time-to-value remains slow​

Only 10% go live in under two weeks​
38% take 1–3 months, 24% take 4+ months​
When implementations run long, top impacts include increased costs (52%) and prolonged fraud exposure (47%)​

Teams are growing, not shrinking​

94% plan to increase headcount despite automation gains​
85% see AI agents as support/augmentation, not replacement (only 12% see eventual replacement)​

Top fraud threats reported:​

  • Account takeovers: 26%
  • Promo/discount abuse: 18%
  • Return fraud: 18%​

“Fraud and financial crime were supposed to become more manageable as AI matured,” said Tamas Kadar, CEO and co-founder, SEON. “Instead, 2026 is the year leaders are confronting a more complicated reality. AI adoption is real, confidence is high, but the scale and pace of fraud — compounded by fragmented systems — continue to drive increased investment rather than reduced overhead. The bottleneck is no longer whether AI works. It’s everything around it: disconnected data, siloed teams, slow implementations. The organisations that pull ahead will be the ones that unify fraud and AML intelligence, shorten the distance between threats and controls, and treat integration as strategy, not plumbing.”​

Fast-Growing Companies Invest in Integration Early​

Organisations growing 51%+ are nearly twice as likely as slower peers to report that achieving unified visibility is “not very challenging.” They treat integration as infrastructure, not an IT project.​

What’s Next: From “Does AI Work?” to “Can We Trust It?”​

With adoption near-universal, the conversation is shifting to governance, explainability and accountability:​

  • 78% say decentralised digital identity will become central to fraud/AML​
  • 33% cite data privacy regulations (GDPR, CCPA) as the biggest external force shaping AML​
  • 25% point to criminals’ advancing use of AI and obfuscation techniques​

The post Despite AI’s Rise, Fraud Teams Keep Growing — SEON 2026 Report appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.

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