WOGLR: The EC’s recommendations on consumer protections

By Dr. Wulf Hambach, Founding Partner at Hambach & Hambach law firm and Dr. Alan Littler, Lawyer at Kalff Katz & Franssen Attorneys-at-law

The European Commission (the ‘EC’) released recommendations regarding consumer protection in the online gambling industry in July 2014 – a measure that is very distinct from its powers to regulate competition in the European market through the commencement of infringement proceedings against Member States. In this article, two leading experts in gaming law – Dr Wulf Hambach (founding partner at German law firm Hambach & Hambach) and Dr Alan Littler (prominent gaming lawyer at Dutch firm Kalff Katz & Franssen Attorneys) – team up to discuss their views on the impact that this new measure can have, in particular at a national level, as well as some of the resistance coming out of Germany.

Read the whole article here

Source: WOGLR

Annual Gaming Industry Event in Amsterdam

On 30 January the Gaming Practice at Kalff Katz & Franssen will host its “Annual Gaming Industry Event” in Amsterdam. Invitees will hear from three highly acclaimed speakers, namely:

– Michel Groothuizen, Director General of Sanctions & Prevention Policy, Ministry of Security and Justice (the Netherlands)
– Joseph Cuschieri, Executive Chairman, Malta Gaming Authority
– Julian Harris, Partner, Harris Hagan, London and past-President of IAGA

The speeches will be followed by a cocktail reception.

***Please note that the event is by invitation only.***

KPMG Summit 2014 The Isle of Man

Quirino Mancini’s interview at the eGaming Summit that took place on the Isle of Man last November. In this little talk with a press journalist given after is panel presentation Quirino calls for the need for the gaming industry to embark on a charity initiative of unprecedented proportions as a way to redress the very bad reputatIon and image of gaming in the face of the media and the public opinion in general.

Censorship reloaded – the new data behemoth is called Financial Blocking

By Ansgar Lange

Internet blocking under the Inter-State Treaty on Gambling (GlüStV): Data privacy activist Thilo Weichert fears that data retention may sneak in through the back door

Kiel, November 2014. It is on the attack again – the state-fed data behemoth, whose crafty limbs have found a new way of outwitting data privacy activists: The current focus of the state surveillance fetishists is the alleged combat of supposedly illegal gaming. On the basis of the GlüStV adopted by the Federal States, the German supervisory authorities – above all the Ministry of the Interior of Lower Saxony, the Federal Financial Supervisory Agency BaFin and the Federal Ministry of Finance – intend to cut off payments to online gaming providers who, in their opinion, are illegal. In order to implement this so-called Financial Blocking, banks and payment service providers are obligated to monitor all payments and to code transactions associated with gaming providers accordingly. However, the practical problems and the problems relating to (data protection) law in the context of the planned measures are manifold, which is, inter alia, the result of an analysis by the Independent State Center for Data Protection in Schleswig-Holstein (ULD). … Continue Reading

Wulf Hambach and Quirino Mancini spoke at the IMGL Masterclass Isle of Man

At the IMGL Masterclass Isle of Man, Wulf Hambach and Quirino Mancini spoke about “Implications of operating in part-regulated and non-regulated online gaming markets” as well as “The Controversial Image of Gaming in the Face of the Media and the Public Opinion: What, if Anything, is the Industry Doing to Redress It?”.

With the sole exception of the lottery association, the gaming industry has so far proved unable to reach out to the regulators, the customers, the media and the public opinion in general in a consistent, coordinated and convincing way to inform and communicate better as well as redress all the bias and bad reputation it “enjoys” in most (if all) of the world.  This interview briefly addresses this big outstanding issue and also suggests a possible way forward that could be represented by a very ambitious charity project of unprecedented scale to be sponsored by the leading gaming companies to show that even the “bad guys” are able and willing do very good things.

Interview Quirino Mancini at Manx Radio: