The Dutch trade association VNLOK has presented its first Responsible Gambling Monitor, outlining how online gambling providers affiliated with the association fulfilled their duty of care in 2025.
The association has highlighted that most interventions are preventive and aimed at raising awareness of gambling-related risks.
Operators sent over 1.2 million pop-up notifications in response to players' gaming behaviour. A single player could receive multiple notifications. VNLOK noted that in most cases, a personalised warning is sufficient, and more serious interventions are not necessary.
VNLOK emphasises that operators assisted players in setting or lowering limits in 21,000 instances to help them maintain control over their gameplay. Furthermore, operators concluded 75,391 affordability checks and advised players to seek professional help in 10,847 instances.
Players were temporarily excluded from participation at a provider as a precaution 60,170 times, with 288 players being involuntarily registered in Cruks. The operator notes that the large difference between temporary exclusion and involuntary exclusion is likely due to the high threshold for involuntary exclusion.
The operators conducted tens of thousands of personal contacts with players regarding their gambling behaviour.
The monitor will provide a foundation for comparable data and insights into the effectiveness of safer gambling measures.
VNLOK Director Rosemarijn Dral stated: “This is an important start, not an endpoint. We want to gain better insight into which interventions are most effective and share that knowledge with regulators and care partners.”
The association emphasises that the duty of care is practised daily by licensed operators.
The Responsible Gaming Monitor is the first of its kind in the Netherlands and is still under development
