Facebook Offers Gambling for the UK Users

Facebook has partnered with Gamesys, an independent gaming company to launch a new branch on its platform. Now users in Britain who are at least 18 can play Bingo on Facebook and the company will pay winners real money.


Photo: Facebook page through a magnifying glass, by Reuters/Thomas Hodel

«Real money gaming is a popular and well-regulated activity in the UK and we are allowing a partner to offer their games to adult users on the Facebook platform in a safe and controlled manner,» said said Julien Codorniou, Facebook’s head of gaming for Europe, Middle East and Africa.

So far, Facebook doesn’t have plans to offer gambling in any other countries or with any other partners besides Gamesys, according to spokeswoman Linda Griffin. The companies will collaborate under the revenue sharing agreement. Facebook, which mainly makes money from online advertising also takes a 30 percent share of revenue for transactions on non-gambling games on its service, such as Zynga‘s Farmville game.

Zynga, is expected to introduce real-money gambling versions of its poker, bingo and slot machine games on Facebook in 2013, says Financial Times.

According to Codorniou said that Facebook was discussing a possibility of other offerings such as casino games—blackjack and roulette—with other gambling companies, but there are no concrete results yet.