Dutch Regulator Hits Illegal Online Casino Group With Record EUR 37.25m Fine

The Netherlands gambling regulator, the Kansspelautoriteit (KSA), has issued its largest ever penalty for unlicensed gambling, fining operator EOD Code SRL EUR 37.25 million. The decision was taken on 6 October 2026 and made public on 22 October, and it targets a group of 12 casino sites, led by InstantCasino, that accepted Dutch players without a local licence. The case is a useful reminder of how an illegal online casino can sit behind a polished, familiar-looking front, and why a valid licence, proper age checks and clear payment rules are worth looking for before you deposit anywhere.

What has happened?

According to the KSA decision, reported by trade outlets including iGamingToday and GamblingNews, EOD Code SRL ran a network of 12 sites that Dutch players could reach, register with, deposit on and gamble at. Alongside InstantCasino, the regulator named Skyhills, SlotMonster, Betiro, BetBlast, FastSlots, GoldenPanda, SambaSlots, Winningz, IncognitoCasino, FoxyGold and LuckyPays.

The operator had already been on the regulator’s radar. After an earlier order subject to penalty payments, a follow-up investigation found that Dutch players could still access the sites. The company’s own terms named Costa Rica as its place of registration and sent any disputes to courts in Curacao. Neither of those gives an operator the Dutch authorisation required to serve players in the Netherlands, which is the point the KSA has enforced here.

How the KSA reached a EUR 37.25m fine

The size of the penalty is striking, and the way it was built matters. The KSA estimated the group’s 2025 gross gaming revenue from Dutch players at around EUR 108.37 million. That figure is an estimate drawn from search and traffic activity rather than company accounts, because the operator did not hand over the financial information the regulator requested on 26 May 2026.

From there, the KSA started at 100 per cent of that Dutch revenue and added 170 percentage points for aggravating circumstances, which produced a headline figure of roughly EUR 292.6 million. Dutch law then caps a penalty at 10 per cent of an operator’s worldwide turnover for the previous year. With estimated global revenue of about EUR 372.99 million, that cap landed close to EUR 37.3 million, which the regulator rounded to EUR 37.25 million. The amount comfortably beats the previous record, a EUR 24.8 million fine on Novatech in March 2026, as reported at the time.

Why an illegal online casino is a risk for players

The reasons the KSA treated this case so seriously double as a checklist of what can go wrong on unlicensed sites. Investigators found no visible and adequate age verification before registration. The regulator was careful to say this does not prove that minors actually gambled, but the absence of a proper check is the problem. It also flagged the group’s contract terms on balances, withdrawal limits and self-exclusion, along with prohibited betting products and weaknesses around deposit limits.

On a licensed casino, those same features are not optional extras. Deposit limits, working self-exclusion, verified payouts and a real route to complain are conditions of holding the licence. When a site operates outside any regulator’s reach, none of that is guaranteed, and a player who runs into trouble has little to fall back on. If you are weighing up where to play, a valid licence and a track record of honouring withdrawals are far better signals than the size of a welcome offer. Our guide to safe online casinos covers the checks worth running.

What it could mean for payments and bonuses

The KSA also took issue with cryptocurrency payments, which it views as a channel that can make money laundering or tax evasion easier. It did not establish that either offence took place, so this is about risk rather than a proven crime. Still, the pattern is familiar: sites that lean on crypto or light identity checks often skip the verification that regulated operators are required to run before paying out. That is worth keeping in mind if you are drawn to crypto casinos or no verification casinos, where the trade-off for speed can be weaker protection.

There is a bonus angle too. Unlicensed operators are not bound by the advertising and promotion rules that apply in regulated markets, so headline offers can be larger and terms harder to pin down. A generous bonus is of little use if a withdrawal stalls because the site was never licensed to pay you in the first place. The KSA has also said it plans to work with payment providers, banks, hosting firms and technology platforms to make black-market sites harder to reach, which suggests the pressure on this type of operator will keep building.

What players should watch next

This fine is unlikely to be the last of its kind. Regulators across Europe have been moving from warnings towards large, turnover-based penalties, and the KSA’s method here shows how quickly numbers can escalate when an operator ignores requests for information. Expect more enforcement, more cooperation with banks and payment firms to block transactions, and continued naming of the specific brands involved.

For players, the practical takeaway does not change with the headline figure. Check that a casino holds a licence for your market, confirm it before depositing, and treat missing age checks, vague withdrawal terms or crypto-only payments as reasons to slow down. If you ever feel your play is becoming hard to manage, the tools on our responsible gambling page are a better starting point than any single site’s own controls.

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Enforcement on this scale is good news for players who stick to licensed casinos, because it narrows the gap between operators that follow the rules and those that do not. The detail that stands out is not the EUR 37.25 million itself but the reasoning behind it: the same age checks, payment safeguards and self-exclusion tools that some players find tedious are exactly the things a regulator will fine an operator tens of millions of euros for lacking. That is a strong argument for choosing a casino on its licence and payout record, which is the approach we take across our casino reviews. We will update this story if the operator appeals or if the KSA confirms further action.