.svg)
Body
The UK Information Commissioner’s Office has said it is assessing a complaint by an anti-gambling addiction group which claims that Sky Betting & Gaming improperly uses its own and third-party advertising tracking technology to target problem gamblers.
In its submission to the agency, Clean Up Gambling claims Sky has no legal basis for tracking consumers, and it has a “flawed approach to consent” for its profiling, making the breadth of data processing “alarming”.
The pressure group is also seeking a wider investigation of the online gambling industry, asserting that it improperly uses customer data in a non-transparent way.
Leeds-based Sky Betting & Gaming, now owned by Flutter Entertainment, does not supply enough information for customers to give informed consent to use of their data and does not allow them to opt out of the profiling, the pressure group claims.
It also does not adequately disclose how it uses the data it collects, according to the group.
The complaint comes as the UK online gambling industry waits for a long-delayed white paper which will guide a planned update of the 2005 Gambling Act.
The group commissioned a report by research group Cracked Labs, an Austrian organisation that calls itself an “institute for critical digital culture”.
The UK’s Betting and Gaming Council, of which Flutter is a member, said it did not want to comment because the issue appeared to address only one company.
A Flutter spokesperson called many of the claims in the Cracked Labs report “inaccurate and based on based on information provided to customers upon request by both Sky Betting & Gaming and third parties we work with”.
“As such, that information includes data that we were not, and would never be, privy to, including personal and financial details.
“All Flutter Entertainment companies manage customer data in a controlled way to ensure that we deliver our products in a safe and reliable fashion, to do all we can to proactively protect our customers from harm, and to ensure that our business meets its legal and regulatory obligation,” the spokesperson said.
Earlier this month, Flutter told the Financial Times that it is a technology-driven business that uses player data in a variety of ways but all data is processed legally and in a transparent manner.
Protecting players and their personal data is of “paramount importance” to the company, Flutter told the newspaper.
Flutter is the world’s biggest online gambling company and its brands include FanDuel, Paddy Power, Tombola and PokerStars.
Clean Up Gambling says it is a not-for-profit organisation supported by former casino games entrepreneur Derek Webb, who spearheaded the anti-fixed-odds betting terminal (FOBT) campaign, Campaign for Fairer Gambling.
UPDATED 12:20pm (BST) on Aug 17: Statement provided by Sky Bet parent Flutter Entertainment.
