Entain lauds new preventative approach to player protection

London-listed gaming operator Entain has completed the initial stage of its pioneering preventative approach to customer protection through the use of analytics and data science to minimise gambling problems before they arise.

The company said that its ARC (Advanced Protection and Care) programme has significantly extended behavioral indicators used to identify potentially at-risk players, with its data scientists now building models to test the extended range of indicators in real situations to identify customers who may show signs of potential problems, as well as people exhibiting intermittent signs of being at potential risk.

In the longer term, Entain hopes to evolve this to offer every customer a personalised playing experience alongside protection tailored to their individual risk profile.

“ARC is fundamental to our future strategy for sustainability and growth,” said Jette Nygaard-Andersen, chief executive of Entain. “We are putting customers first, both by prioritizing their safety through our use of technology to limit individual exposure to risk, whilst also enhancing their experience across all our brands.  We will do this not only in our traditional markets of sports betting and gaming, but also as we grow into new areas, like videogaming and esports as a global entertainment company.” 

Entain group operations director Peter Marcus, who is overseeing the development of ARC, added: “We’re using our technology, leveraging our data and behavioral science, to deliver a fundamental shift in customer care. The real innovation is to apply hyper-personalisation, to customer protection – using insight into the individual behaviors of customers to manage their exposure to risk in real time.”

Entain will launch ARC in the UK in the summer after seeking further input from Harvard Medical School’s Division on Addiction, the Gambling Research Centre at the University of Hohenheim in Germany, and Dr Mark Griffiths, a Distinguished Professor of Behavioral Addiction and Psychology.

This will be followed by an international rollout beginning later in the year.