Widespread Illegal Advertising of Loot Boxes and Social Casino Games in Belgium: Empowered by the EU Digital Services Act to Assess Compliance Using Meta’s Ad Repository

Loot boxes and social casino mechanics are gambling-like products inside video games providing random results in exchange for real-world money. These products may cause harm to consumers, e.g., children and adults experiencing gambling harms. Most countries do not regulate these mechanics as gambling because the random rewards do not possess real-world monetary value as defined by law. Conversely, Belgium uniquely regulates both as unlicensed and therefore illegal forms of gambling; offering these products is a criminal offence. However, this ‘ban’ has not been enforced due to the regulator lacking resources, so these products remain widely available. We investigated whether, beyond failing to remove these products through inaction, companies are also paying to advertise them on social media to specifically attract Belgian users, which is an additional crime. We gained data access through the EU Digital Services Act requiring large online platforms (e.g., Facebook) to provide repositories for all advertising shown and associated audience demographic data. Concerningly, 172 popular games with illegal loot boxes and social casino games were widely and illegally advertised. We studied 1,574 advertisements, which were viewed over 4.5 million times by Belgian users, including 1.26 million times by under-21s. Many other ads we did not study were also widely circulated. The regulator should hold social media platforms and app stores accountable for conducting effective content moderation and ensuring illegal games and ads are not available to local users. More data access opportunities should be mandated by law in the EU and beyond to aid research and enforcement.