European Committee for Standardization (CEN)

Existence of different levels of consumer protection in the online gambling environment.

All online gambling stakeholders (including players, industry representatives, administrations, experts on problem gambling, addiction and criminology academics, etc.)

CEN Workshop Agreement, self-regulatory agreement

Participation fees

32,700 EUR

By definition the CEN Workshop Agreement (CWA) is a voluntary standard applicable internationally and does not have the force of regulation. The CWA offers a mechanism whereby stakeholders can submit their standardisation and specification requirements and develop a result by consensus, validated in an open process. In a CWA all the decision-making powers rest with the interested parties themselves, the members of the Workshop. These include all stakeholders and can come from any part of the globe. They are responsible for the funding and direction of the workshop and for approval of the deliverables. Then it is up to the stakeholders to develop monitoring mechanisms. For instance EGBA decided to introduce the CWA on Responsible Remote Gambling Measures to its own standards (see http://www.egba.eu/en/consumers/standards). As a result all EGBA members (grouping the leading online gaming and betting operators established, licensed and regulated within the EU) are committed to these measures.

As already explained above, EGBA impose the CWA on Responsible Remote Gambling Measures to its members, so that the procedure of enforcement of the EGBA standards also applies for the CWA measures. EGBA can provide on request a compliance certificate of eCOGRA (independent standards authority for the online gambling industry).