Danish regulator says 334 unlicensed gambling websites were blocked in 2025

Spillemyndigheden says the jump in blocked domains reflects tighter monitoring, not a bigger black market. For PSPs and operators, the useful bit is that Denmark is pairing court-backed blocking with faster takedowns across ISPs, app stores, and social platforms.

1. According to its annual report, Spillemyndigheden obtained court approval to block 334 illegal websites aimed at Danish players in 2025. In total, 695 sites were flagged for review together with the Danish Tax Authority’s anti-fraud division.
2. Of those 695 sites, 334 were confirmed by the courts as offering gambling without a Danish licence and were made subject to blocking, while 36 withdrew or changed their services after regulatory pressure. That is the part payment teams should care about: Denmark is not just counting infringements, it is moving them out of the funnel.
3. The regulator said the increase in blocked domains reflected stronger surveillance rather than growth in unlicensed gambling, although a full channelisation study will not be ready until later in the year. On paper, that is a monitoring story; in practice, it means the regulator is watching the market more closely and has more data to back enforcement.
4. Independent traffic data suggests Danish visits to 178 sites blocked in June 2025 fell by around 34 per cent in the following six months. Spillemyndigheden said the results were mixed, with some domains showing little change, which is a reminder that DNS-level blocking works unevenly and is not the same thing as shutting demand off completely.
5. To tighten enforcement, Spillemyndigheden expanded its partnership with Teleindustrien, the Danish ISP trade body, so mirror or “clone” sites can be blocked dynamically without new court orders each time. The regulator also said that Spilpakke 1, introduced in October 2025, widened its power to block affiliate and referral sites and added tougher ad rules, including a whistle-to-whistle ban on betting promotions during live sports.

The report also flags illegal gambling promotions spreading through mobile apps and social and streaming platforms. Spillemyndigheden says complaint channels with Apple and Google are now in place to speed up removal of illicit apps, while licensed operators can report brand misuse directly to Meta to improve takedown times.

For market context, Danish gross gaming revenue (GGR) reached DKK 11.5bn (€1.53bn) in 2025, down 1 per cent from 2024. Online casino gaming overtook lottery as the country’s largest gambling segment, accounting for 38 per cent of the market and generating GGR of DKK4.31bn, up 12.1 per cent year-on-year.