iGaming Business – Irish bookmaker Paddy Power has agreed a two-year deal to continue using Callcredit Information Group’s CallValididate software to identify customers of its online betting service. The solution enables Paddy Power to check a customer’s name, address and date of birth details, as well as allowing it to conduct a real-time check against bank providers’ records. Callcredit said the software not only helps confirm if a person’s identity exists but also that the bank account being used for payment is also linked to the correct name and address, therefore helping to identify potential fraudulent activity. Andy Ryan, customer…

iGaming Business – French online betting and gaming operator PMU has reported that despite a year-on-year drop in sales during the first quarter of 2014, its activity in the period was “in line with expectations”. The operator reported total sales of €2.6 billion ($3.6 billion) for Q1 of 2014, a decrease of 3.4% on the previous year. PMU’s horseracing business suffered the most with an overall drop of 4.5% in sales to €2.4 billion. French horseracing sales fell 7.4% to €2.2 billion in the quarter but this was slightly offset by a 45.6% jump to €192.1 million in international sales….

The Observatory on Online Gaming of the University of Milan ran an event of presentation on a casino games report. The topic was the status of the Italian online gaming market in 201,3 which disclosed some interesting information. Their findings cannot put operators in a very good mood as the gross gaming revenues of the Italian online gaming market were equal to € 725 million in 2013, showing a minor decline of 3% compared to 2012. However, it is more interesting to see the break-down of such data through the different categories of games. Indeed, casino games grew by 63%…

Bugsy Siegel never had to deal with an Internet gambling ban. He opened the Flamingo Hotel in 1946 and launched the Las Vegas Strip, and gambling has held a tenuous position in American life ever since. Now that casinos have spread nationwide and allegedly shed their mafia ties, a new branch of the industry is fighting for legitimacy. Some countries regulate online gambling, like the United Kingdom. Some ban everything, including gambling advertising. Las Vegas based casinos and overseas operators have begun an all-out battle, hoping for an Internet gambling ban. nationwide but carries with it the promise of billions…

The Register – Facebook is planning to launch a mobile payments service that would allow its European users to store and exchange funds via the social network, sources claim. According to a report in the Financial Times, Facebook has filed an application with the central bank of Ireland to become an “e-money” institution under EU regulations and is “weeks away” from gaining approval. Should it succeed in acquiring that status, it would be free to act as a payment institution throughout Europe, thanks to a provision of EU law known as “passporting”. Just what CEO Mark Zuckerberg wants to do…

Poker News – Sweden’s authorities have indicted 10 people for what the Värmlands District Court described as a “major fraud case” involving an online poker scandal which occurred between 2007 and 2011. The incident supposedly involved a large number of players active on Sweden’s gambling company Svenska Spel and a number of other operators. According to a statement released on Wednesday by Sweden’s online gambling regulator Lotteriinspektionen, between 2007 and 2011 the 10 people involved in the court case gained unauthorized access to the operators’ databases and collected a large number of players’ personal data such as email addresses, password…