UK Gambling Commission Finds Problem Gambling in 45% of Illegal-Site Users
Bank records show most of those people kept betting with licensed operators too. The regulator says its data cannot prove illegal sites cause the harm or show how big the black market is.
· 2 min · 2 min read
Britain's Gambling Commission found that 45% of people it caught paying illegal gambling sites scored as problem gamblers, against 6% of licensed-site customers, in a report published Oct. 28.
The score comes from the Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI), a standard screening survey. A score of 8 or higher is its top band, the one that signals problem gambling.
The gap matters because illegal sites lack the protections British law requires of licensed operators. The regulator's data suggests the players most exposed to that gap are the ones already in the most trouble.
Illegal Sites Add to Licensed Betting
The regulator bought anonymized bank records from a YouGov panel of about 38,000 people, covering July 2018 to July 2026. Of 157.2 million transactions, it linked 3,426 to illegal operators, made by 179 people.
The results section shows that 91% of people with repeated illegal payments also bet with licensed companies. Among 122 of them, licensed transactions averaged 24.8 in the month before their first illegal payment and 23.7 in the month after.
Players added illegal sites on top of their usual betting rather than leaving. A further 17% of the illegal-site group scored 3 to 7 on the PGSI, against 9% of licensed customers.
A search for known illegal operators' names in bank records failed, which the regulator says may mean those operators rarely put their names on payments.
The Black Market's Size Stays Unknown
The Commission lists the study's limits: it cannot show that illegal sites cause harm, it misses crypto payments and the panel is not nationally representative. That also means the figures cannot be set against the regulator's national survey of gambling harm.
A separate Commission study published Oct. 20 found the search phrase "not on GamStop" has become a main route to illegal sites. Looking for sites that GamStop does not block was among the strongest predictors of illegal-site use.
Scale remains unknown. The method only catches payments to operators it already knows about, so it cannot find new ones or estimate how much money British players send to illegal sites.
Treat gambling as entertainment you pay for. 18+, and if it stops feeling like entertainment, help exists at BeGambleAware and GamCare.
