Learn how Ontario iGaming licenced software providers can prevent citizens from accessing games at non-Ontario licenced online casinos. (Image from Courtesy of Elchinator)
The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) in Canada has ended online gambling companies’ grace period to remove all connections with non-iGaming Ontario (iGO) licensed platforms.
All companies registered with the AGCO subsidiary, the iGO licensing service, agreed to prevent Ontario citizens from accessing casino games from any platform not operating under the provincial iGaming framework. The rule mostly affects game developers such as Quickspin, Play’n GO, Playtech, Wazdan and other software providers who now hold an iGO licence.
As of Halloween, 31 October, the ‘Standard 1.22’ rule will come into force, and for those companies that do not comply, the consequences could be severe. Fines, licence suspension or revocation.
It is not good news for overseas casinos that accept players from Canada that do not have the required Ontario iGaming licencing. And worst still, the rule prevents those in Ontario that want to gamble using Crypto from playing games from some of the best software providers.
That said, players that want to play using Canadian Dollars remain relatively unaffected. The worst-case scenario is if one of the Ontario-based casinos does not host games from a software provider not licenced in the province, they will need to join an overseas casino. In effect, players can have one account with an Ontario-licensed online casino and another account with an overseas casino.
How is the Ontario iGaming market performing? Just yesterday I covered the market’s second quarter in business. You can see the full ‘Ontario Q2 2022 Online Gambling Revenue Financials’ here.
How does the rule work under the AGCO?
The confusing part is that players in Ontario still have the option to access online casinos not registered with an iGO licenced platform. There is no law preventing this. Also, overseas platforms are not doing anything wrong by offering players in the province the chance to sign up and play at their casinos.
However, Ontario iGaming aims to attract players to online casinos under its provincial iGaming licensing framework. One way of doing this is to prevent game developers from allowing access to games simultaneously from Ontario-licenced casinos and unregulated overseas casinos. In other words, the ultimatum is to choose one or the other.
Now, this doesn’t mean software providers have to remove their games from overseas (non-iGO licenced) casinos offering Ontario player memberships. In fact, if the iGO requested such a strict rule, the market would have failed immediately. Which software provider would restrict its games to a single market? It doesn’t make sense. Therefore, there is another solution.
Solution 1: Casino supple partners block access to Ontario IPs
Instead, game developers like Quickspin, Play’n GO, Playtech, Wazdan and others have to ensure that their overseas casino partners ensure that any players signing up with an Ontario address cannot access their games.
For example, Wildz Casino (reviewed here), is still able legally able to offer players in Ontario access to its online casino platform and Ontario players can sign up for the platform. Now, this casino also offers games from Quickspin, Play’n GO, Playtech, and Wazdan. Each of these providers must contact Wildz Casino and ensure that it will prevent access to its games if an Ontario citizen signs up for its platform.
Solution 2: Software providers block access to Ontario IPs via their delivery system
Another method used as a backup by software providers is blocking Ontario IP addresses attempting to load their games. For instance, if an online casino does not oblige to Wazdan’s request to block access to its game from Ontario IPs, IP blocking offers a second layer of access prevention. As the casino is accessing the game developer’s delivery system anyway, Wazdan has the power to prevent delivery of the game to the casino if the IP detected comes from Ontario.
Does this prevention work? I can safely say that yes it does. Friends of mine in Ontario playing at Curacao (CEG) licenced cryptocurrency casinos like Stake.com casino (reviewed here) were initially unable to access live casino games from Evolution. Now Playtech, Play’n GO, Relax Gaming, Quickspin and Microgaming titles are inaccessible. All these software providers are operating under the AGCO subsidiary iGO licencing.
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