Two systems tracking unlicensed betting sites in Brazil have produced very different counts since President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva signed a provisional measure (MP) on Friday, September 25, banning fixed-odds betting. Bet Legal, a platform operated with cybersecurity company Iron Security, had detected 543 sites by Monday afternoon, according to NEXT.io. A survey from Brazilian industry outlet BNLData counted 6,401 new sites between September 22 and 28.
The measure prohibits the offering, operation, intermediation and advertising of fixed-odds betting nationwide. Licensed operators can no longer accept new deposits and must take their websites and apps offline on 6 October, and federal licenses are scheduled to be revoked on October 25. The government says the ban addresses gambling-related harm and household indebtedness.
Brazil illegal betting sites in Bet Legal’s data
Three publications have reported Bet Legal figures using different time points and measurement windows. Therefore, the numbers should not be treated as directly comparable totals.
| Publication | Point in time | Count reported |
|---|---|---|
| NEXT.io | Within an hour of Friday’s announcement | 41 new unlicensed sites |
| NEXT.io | Saturday | 292 further sites |
| NEXT.io | Monday afternoon | 543 sites in total |
| Casino.org | 6 pm Friday | 295 unauthorized domains |
| Casino.org | Saturday | 294 additional sites |
| Casino.org | Sunday evening | 710 domains, up 141% on Friday |
| SBC Noticias Brasil | September 21 | 102 illegal platforms |
| SBC Noticias Brasil | September 25 | 331 |
| SBC Noticias Brasil | September 26 | 575, up 244 (74%) in 24 hours |
SBC Noticias Brasil took its figures from Amilton Noble, executive director of lottery technology provider Hebara, who in turn drew on the Bet Legal site. The reported numbers do not line up neatly. Casino.org‘s Sunday total of 710 is higher than the 543 NEXT.io gave for Monday, and the Friday figures range from 41 to 331 depending on the outlet and the cut-off used.
Noble commented on the trend, according to SBC Noticias Brasil.
“It will get worse.”
How Iron Security dates the domains
The detection totals say little on their own about when the sites were set up.
Iron Security’s tool logs three dates against each site: when it was detected, when its domain was bought, and when it obtained a security certificate. Company founder and CEO Diego Terrani told NEXT.io that the certificate date is the closest indication of when a site went live. The headline totals use only the detection date.
Of 486 sites detected after 6pm on Friday, Iron Security could trace the acquisition date for 322. Its records show 320 of those domains were bought before the MP, with an average age of about 10 months. The remaining two were bought on Saturday. Some domains were registered in the late 1990s, and Casino.org also reported that 320 of the 322 dated domains predated the ban.
Terrani stressed that ownership records cannot establish when a betting operation actually began. A domain bought years ago could have been converted to betting use after the MP was published. He said 14 addresses on the Bet Legal list were bought during the week the MP was published.
What each system measures
Iron Security says Bet Legal excludes unverified addresses. Each entry is opened and examined individually, identified as a betting operator and cross-checked against the register of licensed operators kept by the Secretariat of Prizes and Betting (SPA). Affiliate pages, domains for sale and duplicate addresses are left off. Because continuous tracking started on September 20, Bet Legal has no earlier baseline for comparison.
The BNLData survey was produced for an industry body. It put the daily average of new sites at 54 in early September. The figure rose on September 24, when news of the government’s coming decision leaked, and reached 1,692 on Saturday and 3,024 on Sunday. Bet Legal published 76 newly detected sites on Sunday.
Magno José of BNLData attributed the gap to methodology, saying his system captures far more than Bet Legal’s. Terrani acknowledged that Bet Legal does not reach every site, but said it publishes only addresses verified one by one.
“A count that multiplies to 3,000 on Sunday, while the other publishes 76, is recording a different event,” Terrani said.
Both sets of figures count web addresses rather than companies, and a single operator can run several sites to replace blocked ones. The National Association of Games and Lotteries (ANJL), which Iron Security is working with, and the Brazilian Institute for Responsible Gaming (IBJR) say 31 million people use licensed platforms. Those platforms verify age and taxpayer ID (CPF) and offer self-exclusion. The regulated industry is citing the detection data to argue that the ban pushes bettors toward sites without oversight.
Government enforcement and blocking
According to the Ministry of Justice and Public Security, 506 websites suspected of offering unauthorized betting have been taken down since the MP was published. NEXT.io described the work as a task force from the Ministries of Justice and Finance. Authorities also identified 43 Telegram channels and groups promoting betting to more than 212,000 members.
The problem predates the ban. Between January 1 and September 22, the SPA referred 57,691 web addresses to telecoms regulator Anatel for blocking, Casino.org reported. From October 6, telecoms operators and internet providers must block betting sites on government orders relayed through Anatel, including sites based outside Brazil.
As of September 25, the government and Anatel had not begun discussing how the blocking would work, NEXT.io reported. The committee responsible for the rules was created on September 28. Anatel did not respond to the outlet’s request for comment.
Supreme Court petitions
ANJL and IBJR filed a joint petition on Sunday asking Justice Luiz Fux of the Supreme Federal Court (STF) to suspend the MP immediately while its constitutionality is reviewed. They argue the government has not shown the urgency needed to use a provisional measure. They also say concerns about vulnerable gamblers, advertising and online casino games were debated at length when the regulated market was created.
The petition asks the court to suspend the ban entirely or, alternatively, to protect existing licensees. A third option would give operators at least six months to wind down. A separate industry body, the National Association for Legal Certainty in Gaming and Betting (Anseja), has also filed a constitutional challenge seeking an urgent injunction.
The MP took effect immediately but must pass Congress to become permanent. SBC Noticias Brasil noted that it was introduced a week before the presidential election on October 4, in which it said polls show Lula da Silva and Fabio Bolsonaro as the leading candidates. It also cited Blask data ranking Brazil’s licensed market as the sixth largest in the world by value, reached in just under two years.
