Gambling Commission publishes updated RTS

Following publication of its response to its October 2016 consultation, the Gambling Commission has now published its updated Remote Gambling and Software Technical Standards (“RTS”), that can be downloaded below, together with the Commission’s announcement. Subject to a number of requirements – set out below – that will come into effect on 1 October 2017, operators have until 1 April 2018 to ensure that the RTS requirements have been implemented.

By way of background, LCCP Licence condition 2.3.1 (applicable to all non-remote gaming machine technical and gambling software licences and remote operating licences, including remote gaming machine technical, remote gambling software and betting ancillary remote licences, but not remote betting intermediary (trading rooms only) licences) states that “Licensees must comply with the Commission’s technical standards and with requirements set by the Commission relating to the timing and procedures for testing”

The RTS detail the specific technical standards and the security requirements that holders of all such licences need to meet. It comprises technical standards and security requirements (that are a subset of the ISO/IEC 27001: 2013 standards).

The following sections of the RTS contain new requirements that are due to come into effect on 1 October 2017 (the new provisions are highlighted in green text in the updated RTS):

  • Live dealer studios (based on existing standards/practice and new requirement makes the Commission’s position clear)
  • Peer-to-peer poker
  • Use of third party software
  • Linked progressive jackpots
  • Virtual sports odds
  • Information security standards (security audits submitted after the implementation date will need to include the new requirements)

The following sections contain new requirements that are due to come into effect on 1 April 2018 (the new provisions are highlighted in blue text in the updated RTS):

  • Display of transactions
  • Gambling account history
  • Display of net deposits
  • Financial limits

The Commission has also updated its supporting Testing Strategy (that can also be downloaded below) to incorporate any new standards and changes made to the numbering of existing requirements as a result of the above.

Update: in July 2017, the Commission announced that it had made the following “minor amendments” to implementation guidance in the Remote Technical Standards:

RTS requirement 1B

  • The published RTS contained a formatting error in which information that was intended as guidance was published under RTS requirement 1B.  This information, detailing what account and gambling history should include, has now been moved to RTS Implementation Guidance 1B.
  • Under RTS implementation guidance 1B the Commission clarified that where transaction history spans over multiple pages, a summary total should be displayed at least on the first screen or page. This minor amendment reflects the original guidance detailed in the Commission’s consultation response.

Linked progressive jackpots

  • The Commission said that it had been asked to clarify whether RTS 9 applies to both linked and stand-alone progressive jackpots. It said that it was unaware of circumstances in which a stand-alone online jackpot would offer a progressive feature without linking player contributions, but to remove any further uncertainty, it has removed reference to ‘linked progressives’ and renamed RTS 9 progressive jackpot system.
Download article PDF: GC RTS June 2017