Booming Games to pay C$70k over Ontario auto-play breach

Online slots in Ontario aren’t allowed to include auto-play, and the province’s regulator has now penalized a supplier after that feature showed up on multiple games for months.

The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) has ordered Booming Games (Malta) Limited to pay C$70,000, saying auto-play functionality was present on several Booming Games titles for a number of months in the Canadian province.

The AGCO said Booming Games failed to properly configure, test, and monitor certain games both before and after launch in Ontario. As a result, the games went live with prohibited auto-play features and stayed that way for several months.

Auto-play lets a slot run spins automatically without the player manually starting each one. Ontario law doesn’t permit auto-play in any game offered by licensed operators in the province, and the AGCO said its game-design standards are among “some of the toughest” in North America.

In explaining the decision, the AGCO tied the penalty to responsible gambling protections, saying standards are meant to reduce “excessive intensity, speed and continuity of play” and support informed decision-making. The regulator also said that, as a registered gaming supplier, Booming Games is responsible for compliance before games reach players and throughout the games’ lifecycle.

The monetary penalties were issued on 20 August, and Booming Games can request a hearing before the Licence Appeal Tribunal (LAT) within 15 days of the penalty notice. The action follows another August enforcement move by the AGCO, which fined Betty Gaming C$120,000 for allowing 23 underage individuals to create accounts.