About this app
What is Happy Fishing?
The focus is on identifying illegal and unregulated gambling sites, operators that offer gambling services without the necessary licence, as well as sites that misuse, copy, or falsely refer to other operators’ licences.
“You can try to stop gambling, but then you go onto foreign gambling sites and crypto casinos and they keep appearing,” Madsen says.
He began watching regulators shut down individual gambling sites, only for mirror sites, cloned domains and replacement URLs to emerge in thier place. The problem, he concluded, was not necessarily the individual website. It was the network behind it.
About Happy Fishing
The decision to use a provisional measure means the restrictions can take effect immediately, less than a month before the elections. This is the clearest indication yet that the sector is being used for electoral purposes to try and secure Lula’s re-election.
The drafting of the text is reportedly in the hands of the Civil House, with some believing that it serves an electoral purpose, meaning Lula potentially riding the wave of criticism against the sector.
The Brazil betting industry has faced increasing scrutiny of late over claims that families are falling into debt because of gambling.
What is Happy Fishing?
Safeguarding has reappeared as a focal point for the regulator. In July of this year, ANJ imposed a €500,000 ($572,797) fine on an unnamed online betting operator, referred to as Company X, for not adequately identifying and supporting customers exhibiting signs of problematic gambling.
The fine followed an investigation that found Company X had failed to correctly identify 29 high-risk players at an appropriate risk level. Six players were missed entirely and 23 were misclassified at a lower risk tier.
The regulator also launched a public awareness campaign earlier this year during the 2026 World Cup to warn of potential gambling addiction risks associated with increased sports betting during the tournament.
