Michael Schmitt is the founder of TRIDER.UK and Editor of Malta Media. He writes about iGaming, gambling regulation, corporate structures, financial services and market integrity, combining investigative journalism with nearly three decades of experience in corporate services and international business.
Germany reported 1,843 illegal gambling websites made inaccessible in 2025. That sounds decisive until prominent operators keep returning through new domains, payment routes and search listings. The problem is not...
When Bet3000 vanished from the German online market, the customers and their money did not vanish with it. The public record cannot trace every displaced euro, but it shows clearly...
Dr Nik Sarafi has turned a series of gambling disputes into a much broader test of the GGL’s legal discipline. His record is not undefeated and the latest decisions are...
Hong Kong and Singapore produced complete player journeys. Thailand and Vietnam added funded play and operator-linked technical routes. None of that proves that Evolution knowingly approved every session, but it...
A conservative internal Bet3000-linked tax compilation records €211,171,607.82 in German payments. Lilith Wittmann's Lottoland investigation points instead to disputed liabilities running into hundreds of millions. The figures are not equivalent,...
Malta Media’s five-year investigation does not declare Evolution guilty of every allegation or Black Cube right about everything. It reconstructs the record, including the newly public Spectrum report and shows...
A €50 provider-wide limit, a €1,000 cash deposit and successful wagers at Tipwin and Neobet around two minutes apart do not prove a regulatory offence. They do, however, touch the...
Playtech went public through the London Stock Exchange this morning, saying the Spectrum Report validates key parts of the Black Cube investigation. Having now read the report material filed yesterday,...
Germany can hit a rapper for €250,000. So where are the fines against its licensees? At a club concert in Wiesbaden, Germany's national gambling regulator used police assistance to serve...
At 12:15 on 26 July 2024, an email reached named officials at Germany's national gambling regulator. Its sender, Dr Damir Böhm, said information had been received from within the circle...
Professor Bernd Grzeszick's defence of SCHUFA G is stronger than the slogan normally used to attack it. He does not treat a credit score as a payslip or a live...
A test dossier received at Malta Media presents a €50 provider-wide LUGAS limit and a €1,000 cash deposit at a Tipwin shop before mobile bets at Tipwin and Neobet. The...
It is very easy to turn Simon Springer into a prophet if you start with the conclusion and work backwards. I am not interested in doing that. Springer spent decades...
There are moments when regulation becomes so complicated that everybody starts discussing procedures and forgets to look at the obvious thing sitting in front of them. Lottoland.com is one of...
The GGL did not uncover a criminal betting ring at Bet3000. It did not accuse IBA Entertainment Limited of money laundering, organised crime or secretly running an illegal sportsbook behind...
There is a point where regulatory silence stops looking cautious and starts looking evasive. The Tipwin, Betanna and Betanna90 material has reached that point. We now have account-continuity tests, German-access...
Mr Charles Cooper handed Random Consulting Limited an enormous gift when he claimed that the Malta-based consultancy was receiving 8.3 million Caribbean guilders, approximately €4 million, every year from the...
Lottoland has become one of the most revealing tests of German gambling enforcement because the case has lasted long enough to remove most of the excuses. German authorities have known...
Germany’s gambling regulator has spent the past few years telling the industry that reliability, transparency and strict compliance are non-negotiable. Licensed operators are expected to document ownership structures, technical systems,...
There is something rather extraordinary about the position Lottoland occupies in Germany today. One Lottoland business is licensed, appears on the official German whitelist and can legally broker state lotteries....
On 26 July 2024, shortly after midday, an email arrived at the Gemeinsame Glücksspielbehörde der Länder that would later become part of the proceedings surrounding Bet3000’s German licence. It had...
Germany has spent years constructing one of Europe’s most restrictive systems for licensed online gambling. Deposits are monitored across providers, self-exclusion is centralised, virtual slots are slowed down and product...
North Rhine-Westphalia has changed the architecture of its regulated online casino market. Licensed concessionaires may now use shared live-casino studios operated by specialist service providers, while the concessionaire formally retains...
Germany’s gambling authority has built a system capable of following the regulated online activity of millions of registered players. It has required licensed operators to connect their systems, transmit information...
While Germany’s gambling regulator warned about the risks surrounding World Cup betting, a company owned entirely by the state of Baden-Württemberg was running its own football-themed online slot competition. Lotto...
The UK Gambling Commission has finally published its settlement with Evolution after genuine Evolution games were found on six unlicensed websites operated by two companies. The Commission says these websites...
Germany has increased the maximum permitted stake on licensed online slot games from €1 to as much as €5 per spin. It is the most substantial change to the regulated...
