Brazilian prosecutors sue Blaze and Virginia Fonseca over alleged abusive betting practices, seeking R$ 120 million

Brazil’s Public Prosecutor’s Office says it has found signs of systematic value retention, account blocking, and betting targets that were “apparently unattainable” at Blaze. For high-risk operators, the useful part here is not the celebrity angle — it is the combination of consumer complaints, technical evidence, and advertising practices becoming part of a civil case.

1. The action, obtained by the press, alleges “abusive practices, systematic retention of values and imposition of betting targets apparently unattainable.” The prosecutors’ case was built on two converging investigative tracks: consumer complaints about deposited funds being systematically withheld, accounts being blocked, and generic explanations being given; and a technical report with more than 42,000 complaints recorded against the platform.
2. The MP is seeking collective moral damages of no less than R$ 120 million. It is also asking for the removal of ads that promise fixed profits, guarantee winnings, or suggest extra income, plus the funding and airing of an educational counter-campaign about the risks of pathological gambling, over-indebtedness, and consumer rights.
3. According to the filing, the investigation began in 2023, when Blaze was operating without any federal authorization. The MP also cites a police inquiry in Mato Grosso that concluded the company used celebrities and digital influencers to bring in users and induce them to play through promises of quick and easy gains.
4. The document says the main targets of these campaigns were people in situations of “economic hypervulnerability,” drawn in by the “illusory promise of ‘extra income’” and by emotional identification with the public figures hired for the promotions. To collect and analyze the company’s advertising, staff from the Federal District MP registered on the platform and monitored Blaze’s marketing.
5. Blaze said in a note that it had not been formally served and that it remains committed to transparency and compliance with the laws and regulations in force in the country. The report is also trying to locate Virginia Fonseca’s defense. In June, the 1st Consumer Defense Prosecutor’s Office in the Federal District had already requested copies of the advertising contracts signed by the influencer with Blaze.

The term to watch for PSPs and acquirers is not “celebrity endorsement” but the paper trail: complaints, account freezes, promotional email flows, and the legal theory around consumer harm. That is the kind of record prosecutors like to build when they want to show a platform’s marketing and payout behavior in the same case.