Twitch Gambling Ban To Expand

Author:

Published: 11 August 2023

4 min

Live streaming service Twitch has announced they’re expanding their ban on gambling streams across their platform. While changes were introduced late last year, these latest bans will impact live streamers with sponsorship or promotional deals with skin gambling sites.

In this article, we’ll explore the changes and why they’ve been introduced.

We’ll review last year’s changes related to dice games, slots and roulettes from sites that fail to provide sufficient consumer protection. Finally, we’ll consider how it’s likely to affect gambling content and viewers going forward.

Recent Ban on Gambling Streams

Twitch, which global giant Amazon owns, has announced they are expanding the ban on live streams of gambling-related content on their platform.

In addition to changes made last year that focused primarily on sites that failed to provide sufficient consumer protection, the organisation is set to ban sponsorships and promotion of skin gambling sites.

Streamers promoting or who are sponsored by Counter-Strike: Global Offensive skin gambling sites will no longer be allowed to use the platform.

Why The Changes?

The gambling ban comes after some controversy last year involving a streamer who was accused of scamming users and other creators to help fuel their gambling addiction.

After the scandal, some of the site’s big-name streamers protested the platform’s lax policies regarding gambling content. This led to the first lot of changes last October. These additional measures are aimed at addressing predatory behaviour in an effort to make Twitch safer.

Recent research (reported by Video Games Chronicle) from a CS:GO streamer known as Houngoungagne, identified around 75% of the top 300 CS:GO streamers are sponsored by skin gambling websites. Trading and gambling of skins (and other cosmetics) in CS:GO has been lucrative for many streamers.

Some sought-after skins are sold for hundreds and thousands of dollars online.

What’s Included in the Ban?

According to an updated version of the Twitch Community guidelines, live streaming skin gambling promotion for CS:GO skins is now prohibited.

This is alongside the existing ban on questionable gambling sites that offer dice games, slots and roulette. Promoting free social versions of gambling websites has also been specifically included. However, broadcasting sites focusing on poker, sports betting and fantasy sports are still allowed.

Streams from online casinos Blaze and Gamdon have been added to the banned list alongside other big names that were announced last year.

What Happens If Users Breach The Policy?

Twitch announced that, like any of their other user policies, account holders may receive disciplinary action if they choose to stream to any of the prohibited sites. To begin with, they plan to leverage warnings in addition to suspensions (where applicable) to provide fairness for those streamers who may not have understood the changes.

Last Years Ban

From October 18th 2022, Twitch introduced tighter rules around gambling streams on their site. The enhanced rules will prohibit any streaming of unlicensed gambling sites in the U.S. (or other jurisdictions) that do not offer specific consumer protections, including waiting periods, age verification protocols and deposit limits.

The ban applies to sites that contain casino games, including slots, roulette or dice games. Although it specifically references U.S. licensing, the ban applies globally to all members, includes free social versions and also prohibits linking to sites in the chat feature.

When Twitch made its changes last year, it identified only a handful of sites that faced the ban, including:

Stake.com
Rollbit.com
Duelbits.com
Roobet.com

When announcing changes, the group did state that they may add additional sites and update their gambling policy accordingly. All prohibited sites will be referenced in the policy so that users have a clear source to identify which sites are affected.

After the policies were implemented last year, the site’s gambling viewership dropped by approximately 75%.

How Will This Affect Gambling Content and Viewers

It’s bad news for streamers who have deals with any of these cosmetic gambling sites. For example, G2 Esports is a large organisation which employs content creators and numerous players.

Earlier this year, they announced a partnership with CSGORoll. The site is a CS:GO skins trading market, so it’s likely to be included in the ban by Twitch. This means that G2 Esports won’t be allowed to promote it during its live streams.

Unanswered questions about Twitch’s new rule

As with any big new announcement, there are still some questions about what the rule means in practice. Presently, it only references sponsorship deals and promotions.

For sites like G2 Esports, there’s been no clear direction on what it means for streamers who have partnership deals and obligations already established.

We’ll continue to monitor and provide updates on any further announcements that impact Twitch streamers that may prohibit streams or ban gambling streams.