Illegal gambling, a multi-million dollar business

Alberto Aceves, Erendira Palma, Karla Torrijos, Juan Manuel Vázquez and Rosalía A. Villanueva

Newspaper La Jornada
Sunday December 18, 2022, p. 4

The legal betting business is millionaire, but nothing compared to the monetary scope of the illegal ones, for which it is estimated that 140 billion dollars are laundered every year. And most of these on a global scale are illegal.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) stresses that the real risk of affecting the integrity of sport is illegal betting, whose profits far exceed the regulated industry in this turn.

The threat posed by illegal betting to sport is amplified by the increasing money laundering associated with this illegal activity. Estimates of the scale and scope of illegal gambling vary, with some estimating that up to $140 billion is laundered through sports betting each year and that the amount wagered in illegal gambling markets ranges from $340 billion to 1.7 billionaccording to the UNODC report.

It is estimated that up to 80 percent of sports and race bets worldwide are placed illegally.warns the body.

No country is exempt from this problem of illegal betting on sports, a particularly attractive terrain for organized crime; UNODC recognizes that in Latin America and the Caribbean it is a growing evil. And it highlights that information on related trends and developments (in the region) is limited.

In Mexico, on June 14, 2021, the Collaboration Agreement was signed with the Financial Intelligence Unit to prevent and combat possible acts of corruption related to games and raffles, including those related to online betting.

The FIU conducts surprise reviews, either once a year or several times; it does so according to the parameters and volumes of operationpoints out Salvador Rotter, professor at the Faculty of Accounting and Administration of the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

Pay close attention to these operations because they are vulnerable activities; In addition, with virtual casinos transfers are onlineadd.

The social impact in Mexico

Given the omnipresence of the betting business, which leaves no room for sports entertainment, advertising and standardization of this practice is increasingly common. In the last NFL game at the Azteca stadium, on November 21, 2022, where the San Francisco 49ers defeated the Arizona Cardinals in front of some 78,000 attendees, the screens of the colossus displayed advertising for a gaming company with statistics useful to participate in some live combinations.

The normality with which this practice has spread is obvious with the 70 million Mexicans who have participated in some of the various forms of betting available, as indicated by Alfredo González Portillo, an official of the National Commission against Addictions (Conadic). . This overcrowding due to gambling may represent a risk to public health, specialists agree.

We are not saying that these 70 million have developed some pathology related to gambling, they may or may not be at risk, but that will depend on emotional control and the use they give to the platforms or where they participate.explains the Conadic specialist.

The use of these mechanisms and practices related to the game have increased around 150 percent, but a pathology is not necessarily developingclarifies.

According to information that emerges from the national survey of the Conadic -adds González Portillo- the first type of game among Mexicans is the lottery; they follow him scratch offs, slots and card games; fifth place is held by sports betting.

Gambling or pathological gambling is a behavior where there is an irrepressible impulse to bet on some game, or several, and it becomes recurrent, episodic and chronic. Not only does it have an impact on the health of those who manifest it, it also presents sociability problems, neglects their daily activities and compromises their heritage or that of other people.

It is a health problem that has increased in recent years in our country and in the world.continues the specialist; is related to the increase and availability of these places, casinos and Internet sites.

Specialists indicate that not all forms of gambling involve this disorder and should not be stigmatized. The game itself, they warn, is an activity of socialization and integration into the community. But you must be careful how you participate in the entertainment that involves gambling.

I am not going to say that it is good or bad to bet, comments Carlos Alberto Vázquez Villegas, a psychologist at UNAM’s Department of University Sports. “It should also be mentioned that companies (casinos, television stations, sports leagues, etc.) influence the development of gambling pathology, but are not the cause of the phenomenon.

Today we see a very big sporting event like the World Cup, where it is common for bets and pools to be made between friends and family. In those cases, for example, we should always understand it as an activity to have fun and nothing more. Without the idea that an income can be obtained there or that our state of mind depends on winning or losingconcludes Vázquez Villegas.