Sky Bet Under Investigation for Unlawful Management of User Data

By Todd Winkler,
Editor at online-gambling.com

Todd Winkler Editor at online-gambling.com

Todd Winkler is another one of our highly professional editors at online-gambling.com. The expert has been part of our team for 6 years, during which time he contributed articles regarding poker, blackjack, and DFS. Winkler is also knowledgeable about New Zealand's legal gambling market.

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Last updated: September 27, 2024

The company behind Sky Betting and Gaming, Bonne Terre Limited, is under investigation by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) for an out-of-date and unlawful cookie policy that their users can’t opt out of. The collected user data was shared with multiple marketing platforms without user consent.

Illegal Sharing of User Data

The ICO has found Sky Bet to be collecting user data through cookies with an outdated policy without the users having the option to opt out. This data was shared with numerous marketing companies for advertising purposes. The complaint that put Sky Bet on ICO’s radar came from the group called “Clean Up Gambling”.

This resulted in an investigation by the Information Commissioner’s Office to find out if the gambling company was deliberately mishandling the personal details of its users in order to target specific player groups. It was found that the brand was managing the data in a way that was not lawful and transparent.

Stephen Bonner, who is the deputy commissioner for ICO, believes that this case can be used as a lesson for other gambling brands on how to properly and lawfully manage user data. She stated, “Our enforcement action against Sky Betting and Gaming is a warning that there will be consequences if organizations breach the law and people are denied the choice over targeted advertising”.

What are Cookies?

Web cookies are small files downloaded to your computer or mobile device every time you visit a website. They are strings of letters and numbers and are used to keep track of your preferences, record what you place in an online basket (for online shopping), which parts of the platform you visit the most, etc.

As you can see, cookies are a way of keeping a history of what you do at every website that you visit. Marketing companies use this data to profile the types of users visiting certain websites to better target their marketing campaigns or research. Cookies can keep a lot of personal information; hence it is a legal requirement to ask for user consent before cookies are allowed.

Cookie Policy Change

Of course, as an answer to ICO’s investigation, Sky Bet has updated their cookie policy to answer to modern lawful regulations. This means that users can now accept or reject cookies upon visiting the brand’s online gambling platform.

The ICO informs that its mission is to be always vigilant for other websites that don’t ask for consent from its users regarding handling personal data. In 2023, the organization reviewed the top 100 brands in the UK and found that 53 relevant websites did not answer the legal cookie policies.