Nine gaming companies face enforcement for unfair practices: *the evidence question*

What happened

Consumer protection authorities in 17 EU countries announced on 9 January 2025 that they are taking enforcement action against nine online gaming companies ^[1]. The companies are suspected of unfair commercial practices under Directive 2005/29/EC, the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive.

The investigation was coordinated through the Consumer Protection Cooperation Network, with Sweden's Consumer Agency (Konsumentverket) as one of the participants. The authorities have not named the companies, but the joint statement says the practices under scrutiny include unclear information about costs, manipulative design and lack of transparency about how the games work ^[1].

The companies now have until late January or early February 2025 to respond and show that their practices comply with the law.

The evidence burden

Here is where it gets interesting for anyone running a digital service. Under Article 12 of the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive, when a national authority brings a case alleging an unfair practice, it can require the trader to produce evidence about the factual accuracy of their claims ^[2].

If the trader does not provide that evidence, or if a court considers it inadequate, the claims can be treated as inaccurate. In other words, the burden of proof can shift.

Think of it like this: if someone disputes that your sale really was a sale, saying "trust me, the prices were higher before" is not enough. You need to show what the old prices were, when they applied and where customers saw them.

In these gaming cases, the authorities are asking the companies to show how their systems work. That includes what information is shown to players, how randomness works in games of chance, what the actual costs are and how in-game purchases are presented.

What this means for you

If you run a digital service, automated process or AI system that interacts with consumers, ask yourself:

• Could you show exactly what a customer saw on a given day, if they claim the information was misleading?
• Do you keep records of how your pricing, discounts or recommendations worked at different points in time?
• If a supervisor asked how your system behaved three months ago, would you be able to prove it, or would you have to trust your own memory and logs?

Consumer protection cases often turn on what was shown and when. A screenshot from a customer is their evidence. What is yours?

How a digital witness fits here

This is a case where a digital witness has a strong fit, because the question is exactly what the system showed, when it showed it and how it worked.

Here is what you would seal: the version of the terms shown to a user, the price displayed at the point of purchase, the random number generator's state and parameters for a game round, and records of what discounts or bonuses were active. For a chatbot or an AI assistant, you would seal each answer as it is given.

You seal it at the moment the information is shown or the process runs. The content itself stays with you; only a fingerprint goes to WitniumChain.

When a customer or an authority questions what happened, anyone you share the record with can check that it is exactly what existed at that time. Change one character in the terms or one digit in the price, and the fingerprint will not match.

What a witness does not do: it does not show that your practice was fair, that your terms were clear or that you complied with the law. It shows that the record is what it was.

Say a customer claims they were shown a €10 discount that vanished at checkout. With a sealed record of what the checkout page showed when they reached it, you can show exactly what was there. Without it, the discussion becomes one person's word against another's.

How it would work

1. Your checkout system sends a fingerprint of the page state (prices, discounts, terms) to WitniumChain as the page loads.
2. You get a witness ID back and store it with the session.
3. When the claim comes in, you share the page record and the witness. The other side calculates the fingerprint and checks it against the sealed one.

The first 2,000 witnesses a month are free. You can start with the REST API, the SDK or the MCP server.

What to watch

The Consumer Protection Cooperation Network has been increasingly active in coordinated enforcement. This is the second sweep targeting online gaming in recent years, and the first since the AI Act came into force.

For AI systems that recommend products, set prices or interact with consumers, the transparency and record-keeping duties in the AI Act will add to what consumer protection law already requires. If your system influences purchasing decisions, expect more questions about how it works and what it shows.

The companies in this case have until late January or early February 2025 to respond. How those responses turn out may set the tone for enforcement in other sectors.