This story is wild. Just goes to show that you need to do your research before putting your wagers down.

The Fake Indian Cricket League Created for Real Online Betting:

The tournament was also listed on 1xBet, a controversial betting website registered and headquartered in Cyprus and licensed globally in Curaçao. The company offers bets on 60,000 events monthly but has been blocked in countries including Russia, where it originated, and the UK, where a Sunday Times investigation found evidence that it was taking bets on Kenyan children’s sports.

Journalists have investigated the link between 1xBet and lower-level match-fixing. Jack Kerr, an investigative reporter at the Norwegian magazine Josimar, discovered that 1xBet regularly set odds for fake sporting competitions across dozens of sports: a women’s handball match supposedly played between France and Norway that was in fact played by teenage girls, for example. The competitions take place in sports halls and warehouses in eastern Europe and appeared exclusively on 1xBet, though it was unclear who would be betting on these games. Kerr’s research suggested that 1xBet was responsible for setting up these operations, which he calls “sporting data sweatshops.”

Written on September 8, 2024