Key points:
- 93% of players in the Netherlands gambling with legal providers
- Search volume data indicates black market may have grown
- Average player losses per month falls to €80 ($94)
The Kansspelautoriteit (KSA, the Dutch Gambling Authority) has released figures that at least partially allay fears of regulatory overreach shunting players into illegal market, though the figures are not uniformly positive.
In a panel at iGB Live, Peter Rampertaap shared a measurement taken on channelling, which is included in the analysis.
According to the research, 93% of players in the Netherlands only play with legal providers – though when pressed, Rampertaap was keen to nuance this statistic with the admission that GGR across licensed and unlicensed companies is far harder to calculate.
The KSA report concedes: “There is a chance that heavy players now play with illegal providers.”
Two studies were carried out to explore the effectiveness of rules introduced in 2024 to protect players.
Compulsory player contact with operators before setting deposit limits above €350, or €150 for young adults, has seen the number of users gambling with those higher limits decline to less than 50%.
Good to know: The KSA has recently been clamping down on influencers advertising illegal gambling activity on social media
Other Ministry of Justice and Security imposed rules have also shown encouraging signs of success.
Limits on net deposits allied with affordability checks have led to lower average losses per player account.
That figure has shrunk from an average of €116 per month to €80, while the average number of accounts per player has remained roughly stable, giving no strong indication that players have begun mitigating restrictions by gambling with more providers.
The growth of the black market is difficult to quantify as unlicensed operators do not readily share revenue figures and player data, but worryingly for Dutch regulators the search volume of the top 100 illegal websites has increased.
iGB Live panel: KSA and the effects of its stricter player protections
At iGB Live, KSA Coordinator of Operational Supervision Peter Rampertaap, led a panel to discuss the measures the regulator has taken in the past few years and the effects these have had on the industry.
He briefly discussed how the online market opened on 1 October 2021, but the regulations took over ten years to pass through parliament before being fully adopted. This, he says, was likely due to how controversial the industry is - and continues to be.
The regulator has continued to adapt and change with the evolving market, though. Rampertaap explained that as soon as it went live, there was a flood of advertisements from operators, due to the minimal guidelines around promotional material.
Players lost a lot of money in a short period of time and there was both a societal and political reaction. The KSA stepped in to enforce additional rules and stricter player protections. Radio advertisements were banned two years ago, while sports betting ads were banned as recently as 1 July this year.
In April 2025 (Rampertaap did say this was handed out a little earlier in the year, but this was when the courts could publicise it), the KSA handed out a €734,000 ($864,200.59) fine for the violation of the duty of care concerning young adults - the first of its kind.
To create a more proactive environment, the regulator also upholds a two-hour response to harmful behaviour. Operators have two hours to act when a player is at risk of harm: one hour to analyse, one hour to implement the intervention
Rampertaap went on to discuss that he believes the publication of positive developments are just as important as the bad ones, because it sets a solid example for the rest of the industry (positive reinforcement and all that).
The KSA themselves asked: Who are we there to protect? Those who have massive losses? Casual players? Addicts? All of these groups will require different actions to be taken, and any action may negatively affect the others
Finally, the regulator discussed how it is moving away from the traditional financial indicators to non-financial ones.
Someone might not lose a lot of money, objectively, but may still have an addiction. They might lose their job, have interpersonal relationships break down, which are all significant behavioural flags for harmful behaviour. However, non-financial indicators are more difficult to use, so the KSA will continue to monitor how best to use these.
