Gambling companies have a responsibility to stamp out corruption in esports, according to one betting industry official.
The reputation of esports has been harmed by some scandals including match-fixing, cheating and underage gambling. Though it’s not frequent, it’s still something that rears its head and something that Luckbox needs to be stamped out for good.
Recent examples include CSGO player forsaken being banned after using a hack in an ESL Premiership event and Clash Royale payer Jimit Bhatt being suspended for 12 months for cheating.
Lars Lien (pictured), founder and CEO of esports betting operator Luckbox.com, says the legitimate operators in the gambling industry have a duty to help clean up the reputation of esports.
Luckbox is a member of the Esports Integrity Coalition (ESIC), which works to maintain standards in esports. ESIC previously called on the community and different stakeholders to come together and agree on a set rule and procedure to deal with cheats.
Lien said: “Gambling will happen and it’s a matter of making sure that responsible operators work together to stamp out match-fixing and to help prevent it. We have an integral role in eliminating that from our world.
“This is why we’re part of ESIC, where we and other responsible operators share suspicious alerts. So if we see betting patterns that are not consistent with a normal match, we report to ESIC and they will investigate the event in question. They work with tournament organisers, teams, they educate players, they work to stamp it out.”
Luckbox also holds an Isle Of Man gambling licence, which they say offers esports fans ‘the highest levels of security and protection’ to bet on Dota 2, CSGO and League Of Legends.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
