Yolo Group joins betting integrity body IBIA ahead of Brazilian market launch

Yolo Group has joined the International Betting Integrity Association (IBIA). The Group was established in 2014 and has offices in Estonia, Malta, Brazil, Australia and Guernsey. Its Sportsbet.io brand will now feed into IBIA’s leading global integrity monitoring network. The operator joins around 50 companies and over 125 leading sports betting brands in IBIA and further cements the association’s position as the world’s leading operator-run integrity monitoring body.

The move comes ahead of the anticipated opening of the Brazilian sports betting market which will require, as a condition of licence, that an operator engage with an integrity monitoring body. A number of Brazilian focused operators joined IBIA in 2023 and according H2 Gambling Capital, the leading independent authority on global gambling market data, IBIA members already account for over 60% of remote gambling in Brazil making IBIA uniquely placed to protect the integrity of that market.

Matthew D’Emanuele, CEO Yolo Entertainment at Yolo Group, said: “We take our betting integrity incredibly seriously at Yolo Group, and that’s why joining the IBIA is such an important step for us. Our industry relies upon safeguarding sporting competition, and we’ll be working closely with the IBIA to provide all the support we can to help provide a fun, fast and fair environment for sports betting.”

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Khalid Ali, CEO of IBIA, said: “I am delighted to welcome Yolo Group to the association. Yolo Group’s decision to join IBIA demonstrates the company’s desire to utilise the best integrity protection available globally for its sports betting product and further expands IBIA’s leading integrity monitoring network. The association looks forward to working closely with the operator to protect it from corrupt betting activity both on a global stage and in relation to specific markets such as Brazil.”

IBIA is a not-for-profit body that has no competing conflicts with the delivery of commercial services to other sectors and is run by operators for operators to protect regulated sports betting markets from match-fixing. IBIA’s global monitoring network is a highly effective anti-corruption tool, detecting and reporting suspicious activity in regulated betting markets. Through the IBIA monitoring network it is possible to track transactional activities linked to individual customer accounts.

IBIA’s recently released 2023 annual integrity report detailed 184 alerts reported in the year, which represents a decrease of 101 (or 35%) on the revised 2022 figure of 285 alerts. IBIA alerts contributed to the investigations and subsequent successful sanctioning of 21 clubs, players and officials in 2023, an increase on the 15 sanctioned in 2022.