It is hard to find a 100% safe and secure casino site, and there are many reasons why gamblers may find it hard.
Firstly, Cyprus is a gray zone for online casino gambling. It doesn’t allow offshore online casinos officially but it doesn’t block them, doesn’t ban access to them, and doesn’t persecute people for playing at those casinos. It means that online casinos operated from abroad can offer their services to locals and accept real money deposits and withdrawals, but at the same time, they are not regulated by any local law. Therefore, in case the casino turns out fraudulent, the local agencies will not be able to protect the customers’ rights.
Secondly, some of the best online casino Cyprus are operated from abroad by well-known operators that have been in the industry for decades. These casinos are 100% licensed and regulated by reliable international agencies such as the MGA, Alderney, Curacao, etc. They have been tested with time and hundreds of other real money gamblers. But if you are in Cyprus and you ask a relevant authority if these sites are legit and secure, they will answer “no” because formally, these sites are not licensed by Cyprus.
Thirdly, even the most skillful gamblers playing at the best-paying casino sites sometimes lose money or fail to wager through the bonuses, or by mistake violate some casino rules like the highest bet limit with an active bonus. This is frustrating, but experienced gamblers are at least aware this was not the casino’s fault. Beginner gamblers, however, often blame their failures or bad luck on the casino and claim that this or that site is not safe and not secure.
And fourthly, some sites are indeed not licensed, not safe, and put their customers’ personal data and money at risk.
So, how to tell a safe casino from a non-safe one?
Licenses
A safe casino is a licensed casino, that’s for sure. Speaking of Cyprus, there are some online casinos licensed by Cyprus but the irony is that few of them are allowed to provide services to locals because the government doesn’t have the relevant laws.
So, the obvious decision is to check out whether the casein is licensed and by what authority. For Cyprus, all reliable agencies that license international casino sites will do – MGA, Curacao, Gibraltar, UKGC, Isle of Man, etc.
However, the fact that the casino states it has a license is not enough because some sites fail to re-acquire their expired licenses and just keep the badge on their homepage. Absolutely fraudulent casinos have never even had a license so they either fake the badge or have none.
Therefore, the player should not only check whether there’s any badge in the footer, but also look for the license number in T&C, or follow the link attached to the badge to see whether there is a real active document behind it.
Providers & Software Testing
Some bigger online casino platforms order their software testing to get additional certificates from independent testing companies and prove their software is fair, transparent, and not scammy. These certification badges are usually placed in the footer along with licenses, seals of trust, etc.
Smaller casino sites may not be able yet to invest in software testing, but in any case, if the casino site has its lobby backed by many high-quality and reliable providers, there is a high chance that these providers had their software tested independently.
Online casinos don’t usually develop their own games, this is a complicated and costly process and a different niche in the industry. Casino operators buy games from providers – studios that develop casino games. To be attractive to casinos and to prove to the players that their games are fair, providers have to order software testing and get certificates. Therefore, even if the casino is not clearly certified, its provider partners should be.
Payment Methods
A second crucial group of partners that directly impacts the online casino’s safety and reliability is online payment processing companies that provide banking methods for depositing and withdrawing money to and from online casinos.
Well-known and reliable payment methods such as Visa, Mastercard, Paysafecard, Skrill, Neteller, etc., have been in the niche for decades and can be trusted. Unknown or very new payment methods, on the other hand, make the casino less reliable.
