Lucia Gando of SBC Noticias views that Chile’s judiciary can no longer serve as the referee of an unfinished Gambling Law as political burdens now fall on the Senate and Parliament to break long-standing deadlocks.
Internet service providers in Chile must enforce a full blocking of traffic to unlicensed gambling websites.
The direct order comes from the Supreme Court and applies to the country’s largest telecom and internet providers: Claro, Entel, Telefónica, WOM, and VTR.
The ruling upheld an appeal by Lotería Concepción, which had initially been rejected by the Court of Appeals, after it denied that ISPs were obligated to restrict access to gambling websites.
Since 2023, Chile’s judiciary has become a battleground for the municipal gambling firms of Lotería Concepción, Polla Chilena (football pools) and Teletrak (horseracing), who are determined to block foreign remote operators from reaching local audiences.
Telecom firms were given a list of domains to terminate, including high-profile brands such as Betano, Coolbet, JugaBet, Rojabet, and Betsson. ISPs had previously argued neutrality, pointing out that online gambling remains unregulated in Chile — an issue debated by political chambers since 2023.
However, the Supreme Court recalled that the principle of net neutrality protects only legal content, ruling that the companies’ refusal to block the sites was “illegal and arbitrary.” The Court underlined: “While there is no direct prohibition on online gambling, it is only legal if expressly licensed.”
Back to ground zero
In Chile, legal battles are likely to continue as the judiciary grows fatigued by the Senate and government’s inertia in settling the outstanding terms of a new gambling law.
At present, Chile has no legal framework for online gambling. Since 2022, efforts have been under way to establish a regulated regime that would license foreign businesses already active in the market. Yet each year, Chile has stumbled over directives needed to finalise the bill.
In 2023, significant progress was made, with articles approved on criminal determinations, taxation, and sports integrity. However, the Economic Committee of the Senate rejected the move, judging the bill to be unfinished.
The Committee argued that further resolutions were required on IT authorisations for licensing and on advertising rules. An additional hurdle emerged when the Committee ruled that municipal operators — Lotería Concepción, Polla Chilena, and Teletrak — should receive compensation for lost privileges once the regulated market is launched.
Complicating matters further, a high-profile legal dispute unfolded between the Chilean FA (ANFP) and the Ministry of Justice over football sponsorships that clubs had entered into without formal legislation.
Though the Senate has now restarted deliberations to complete the Gambling Bill in 2025, it must once again confront and resolve these unfinished conflicts — with entrenched camps needing to be reconciled before any market launch can take place.
Progress is a game of inches
Chile’s legislators are inching towards bringing some form of order and determination to gambling. The gambling bill, currently in its second reading in the Senate, seeks to regulate an online gambling industry worth more than $150m a year.
Under the proposed framework, the Treasury expects to raise 84bn pesos (circa $90m) in tax revenues. The scheme sets a 20% specific tax on gross gaming revenue (GGR) for licensed operators, to be applied in addition to VAT. The government views a total tax burden of just under 28%, placing Chile in the mid-range compared with international markets.
The bill also introduces earmarked social contributions: a 1% levy for responsible gambling initiatives and a 2% charge on sports betting revenue to support the development of Chilean sport.
The draft law promises to shield players, particularly Chilean youth from harms, demand transparency in the flow of funds, and bolster consumer trust through the certification of game randomness. A licensing system would also foster competition among authorised operators while channeling illegal ones into the regulated fold.
Officials have been blunt about the scale of the problem. Mario Marcel, the finance minister, warns that since 2022 the industry has grown outside the law, “without paying taxes, without complying with regulations, and at risk of excesses.”
Yet remote operators have held firm against the continued delays in legislation, stressing that they have respected the remit of the Bill and adopted best practices in collaboration with stakeholders such as ANFP, even while Chile has lacked any legal framework for online gambling.
No guarantees
Undersecretary of the Treasury, Heidi Berner, was equally stark: the opacity of ownership and funds leaves the market open to money laundering and illicit financing.
The bill also envisages institutional reform. The Superintendency of Gambling Casinos (SCJ) would be recast as the Superintendency of Casinos, Betting and Games of Chance, with expanded powers to supervise and sanction operators.
Though boundaries now appear to be set, the passage of the Bill is likely to come under scrutiny from municipal gambling operators seeking compensation and the preservation of their privileges — with the judiciary still expected to play a decisive role.
Whether the law can survive Chile’s fractious politics is another matter. But the Supreme Court’s ruling against unlicensed sites has only heightened the pressure on parliament to act… a saga continues.
