Denmark's gambling regulator, Spillemyndigheden, launched a national awareness campaign for parents on Monday 26 October 2026 about gambling-like features in the video games children play. The campaign is called "Kasino på børneværelset", or "Casino in the Children's Room".
Its centrepiece is a short film in which a child's bedroom gradually turns into a casino. According to CasinoBeats alone, the film is running on Meta, YouTube, TV2 Play and Folkeskolen.
Three shop fronts were also dressed up as a "Casino Kids" venue: at Bruuns Galleri in Aarhus, on Vestergade in Odense and on Købmagergade in Copenhagen.
Spillemyndigheden Director Anders Dorph said public debate about children and digital media often centres on screen time. In his view, parents should also take an interest in what games contain and the mechanisms children encounter while playing.
Yogonet reports that the regulator warned many popular children's games include features resembling gambling, among them loot boxes, randomised rewards and in-game purchases. That detail does not appear in the CasinoBeats account.
The campaign directs families to StyrPåSpillet, an information platform covering gaming, gambling-like features and gambling addiction, with advice on how to talk to children about the games they play.
The campaign follows earlier Danish research on the subject. In 2021, Spillemyndigheden and VIVE, the national welfare research centre, published a study based on interviews with 107 children and young people aged 10 to 19. The researchers also interviewed five young adults who had experienced serious problems with gaming or gambling. The study found that gambling-related features in games and skin betting were comparable to online gambling, and it called on parents to get involved in their children's online activity.
Only Yogonet's report includes a Swedish figure. It cites a report from Sweden's regulator, Spelinspektionen, which Yogonet says was published last year: 87% of people who bought loot boxes before the age of 15 displayed risky gambling behaviour as adults.
We do not know the sample size or how Spelinspektionen defined risky gambling behaviour; the original Spelinspektionen report would settle it.
CasinoBeats reports that Spillemyndigheden has not announced any new rules for game developers as part of the campaign.
The wider regulatory picture rests on single-source reports. According to CasinoBeats, a political agreement on the Danish gambling sector was signed on 24 October 2025 and presented as a package to curb problem gambling and protect children and young people. Yogonet separately reports that in October 2026 the Danish government said it would resubmit a gambling advertising bill first introduced in October 2025, which would ban anyone under 25 from appearing in gambling ads and ban gambling advertising during live sports broadcasts.
The campaign's budget and planned run are also unknown to us. Viewing figures from the regulator or a follow-up survey of parents would show whether it reached its audience.
Prepared with AI from independent sources and published automatically, without prior editorial review. How we use AI