TORONTO - Ontario is putting away the carrot and reaching for the stick.
- Comments made by key Ontario officials suggest the province has run out of patience with online sports betting and casino gambling operators that have yet to join its regulated market, yet continue to take bets from residents.
- The province’s sports betting regulator has been talking to media and financial institutions to alert them about business they may be doing with unregulated operators.
- Those efforts are set to continue, and perhaps ramp up, as Ontario tries to squeeze the 20% or so of online gambling in the province that still happens outside its authorized channels.
The province, the first in Canada to launch a regulated online gambling market that allows for private-sector participation, has funnelled more than 80% of mobile sports wagering and casino play onto locally regulated apps and sites.
However, that still means roughly 20% of all online Ontario sports betting is happening with operators that may be regulated abroad or outside the province, but not by the province itself.
AGCO calls on media platforms to step up the fight against unregulated online gambling sites: https://t.co/UEwUL9OZEF pic.twitter.com/dyUEnk5Ckx
— Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (@Ont_AGCO) May 14, 2025
Canada’s most populous province is now increasingly trying to make life difficult for those offshore and unregulated holdouts, seeking to sever their relationships with advertising partners, banks, and payment processors.
Those efforts were highlighted Wednesday at the Canadian Gaming Summit in Toronto, via comments by several officials who are well-positioned to know what’s happening.
“The market's matured enough now that people have had an opportunity, and if they're not going to go through the door, it's time that they stop playing in our market,” Ontario Attorney General Doug Downey said. “And I think [iGaming Ontario], [the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario] and the responsible gaming people all understand that that's really important. So I think you'll see a little bit more aggressive approach in that space.”
Downey added that he was aware of "some moves that have been made" to try to have internet service providers and website hosts stop their support for unregulated operators.
"And I think that's acceptable," the AG said. "It's only fair to those who are playing by the rules."
The comments from Ontario’s chief law officer suggest the province could be turning up the heat on offshore and illegal sports betting and casino gambling operators. That is something the province's sports betting regulator said it hoped to do earlier this year.
You're out of touch, you're out of time
Ontario launched its competitive iGaming market in April 2022, and there are now 50 private-sector operators participating. That also means more than three years have passed for other operators to take the province up on its offer to legally offer online sports betting, as well as Ontario online casino games, and poker.
The province also allowed so-called “grey market” operators, which were already taking bets in Ontario, to transition into the new regulated market and officially compete for business against their peers and the government-owned Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp.
But there is a limit to Ontario’s patience, and for some operators, that limit might have been reached.
Ontario Attorney General @douglasdowney says he thinks "a little more aggressive" approach toward the unregulated iGaming market is coming from the province. Ontario's iGaming market has matured enough, and operators have had plenty of opportunity to join that market, he says.
— Geoff Zochodne (@GeoffZochodne) June 18, 2025
In May, for example, the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) announced it had contacted more than a dozen media platforms to urge them to stop promoting “unregulated online gambling and sports betting sites like Bodog.”
“By airing ads for Bodog and other unregulated operators, legitimate media platforms are providing a veneer of legitimacy to unregulated and high-risk sites and creating confusion for Ontarians,” the regulator said in a press release.
Bodog was recently hit with a court injunction in Manitoba over the company’s operations in the province. The offshore sportsbook remains available in Ontario as well, which could be another reason why the AGCO saw fit to single out the Antigua and Barbuda-based operator.
Bodog is unlikely the only object of Ontario’s opposition, though, and the AGCO is also doing more than just warning potential media partners.
Take it to the bank
Dave Forestell, the chair of the regulator’s board of directors, said Wednesday that Ontario first tried to make things as easy as possible for operators to enter its legal market. The second phase, he added, was to provide a "white glove service" to the slower entrants, taking them by the hand and guiding them toward provincial regulation.
Phase three is the AGCO making things difficult for operators that continue to avoid Ontario's oversight. And while the regulator may not have an "enforcement mandate," it does have ways of doing that.
“We've called together banks, payment processors, and others to let them know we publish a list of legal operators,” Forestell said. “So if you're providing banking services, payment services, to somebody not on this list, you are facilitating an illegal operator in Ontario.”
The AGCO chair added that the regulator plans to keep up the pressure. He also said that "a number" of broadcasters the regulator contacted about unregulated operator advertising have vowed to no longer accept those ads.
“I think we just believe it's really important that for a licensed market to function efficiently and fairly, you need to make sure that those people who have chosen to operate in the market legally are well treated by government,” Forestell said. “And that part of our ability, or our duty, is to make sure that we are squeezing that illegal marketplace down to the smallest possible size by going after their ability to generate revenue.”
