The under-the-radar ‘epidemic’ of underage gambling

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Robin, a third parent, said her son’s private school brought in a gambling counsellor to address the students because of concerns about widespread betting. Even during that assembly, she heard, teenagers were on their phones gambling.

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“My son knows kids who have lost thousands of dollars,” she said. “One kid won $6,000 on slots at (school) lunch.”

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Redlick, who teaches a professional-development course on gaming law at the Law Society of Ontario and is executive director of the Canadian Addiction Recovery Association, said he has sympathy for parents, especially given that marketing for Internet betting inundates sports broadcasts and other media. Ontario did ban sports celebrities from those ads, but it still allows them to appear in so-called “responsible-gaming” spots that are produced by the same companies and present the topic in a generally upbeat way, he noted. Redlick cited a BetWay commercial featuring Vladimir Guerrero Jr., the Toronto Blue Jays superstar.

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“It seems like the government has offloaded this to the families and parents,” he said about underage gambling. “It’s giving lip service to responsible gambling.”

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Yet it’s not always a conscious decision by parents to let their teenagers use the apps. Some kids anxious to open accounts will borrow IDs without permission and even take pictures of their parents to upload, claiming they’re for some legitimate use like “Christmas photos,” said Redlick.

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And the guardrails the sites have put in place are not totally foolproof, suggests a recent prosecution by the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario. The regulator fined Betty Gaming Ltd. $120,000 for “failures” that let at least nine people under 19 years old create accounts, deposit money and gamble and another 14 set up accounts without depositing money.

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The age restriction is “one of the most basic and important safeguards” in Ontario’s regulated system, said AGCO CEO Karin Schnarr about the case. Like Alberta’s new initiative, Ontario’s policy licences gambling companies to set up sites and advertise.

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It is illegal to facilitate access to underage online gambling in Ontario, confirmed Ontario Provincial Police spokeswoman Tracey Mellersh. But the force has yet to lay any charges, preferring a harm-reduction, education-based approach, warning parents and guardians about the law and the risks of young people betting, she said.

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Meanwhile, unregulated gambling apps also operate online, often making little or no attempt to bar minors. The Ontario Provincial Police charged one person in 2024 in a scheme involving a site called TopBets, after several underage teenagers in Orillia, Ont., were allegedly lured into gambling, then threatened with violence when they racked up debts.

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Similar to the other parents, Kath said her son made the case that his friends were already doing it. It seems to be a highly social activity, groups of boys gathering to bet on a sports event or casino games, she said.

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Kath likened her approach to that of parents who let underage children consume alcohol under their supervision rather than take a hard, no-drinking line, knowing the kids will imbibe regardless. What’s more, she says her son Matt is a highly disciplined boy and accomplished athlete whom she knew would not become addicted.

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In fact, Matt, now 17, said in an interview that he eventually realized “this is not good for me” and deleted the app on his phone. But he’ll still get together with friends and contribute to a group bet on someone else’s account.