Pennsylvania Becomes the First US State to Launch the PlayPause Self-Exclusion Tool

The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board (PGCB) and Conscious Gaming have joined forces to debut PlayPause for the first time in a gambling legal state in the USA to ramp up responsible gambling efforts. PlayPause is a proprietary technology tool developed by GeoComply in a bid to revolutionize and reinforce the effectiveness of responsible gaming programs across the gaming industry in the United States.

Conscious Gaming on the other hand is a new non-profit organization that was formed by GeoComply and the body’s primary responsibility is to roll out PlayPause in US jurisdictions with legal gambling. This innovative online self-exclusion tool will be availed to operators and regulators in different US states for free.

The self-exclusion tool ushers in a new dawn in the burgeoning gaming industry where player responsibility is at the center of internet gaming. Thanks to the arrangement between Conscious Gaming the non-profit and the PGCB, Pennsylvania is paving way for the adoption of a more player protective approach for the country’s gaming industry at large.

What Role Will GeoComply’s PlayPause Tool Play in USA’s Internet Gaming Sector?

PlayPause powered by GeoComply was launched on Wednesday, the 23rd of December in Pennsylvania. It will furnish PGCB licensees with a geolocation service whose purpose will be to block any players who aren’t within Pennsylvania’s state lines from taking part in any form of internet gaming offered in the Keystone State.

For Pennsylvania and other USA states which will be deploying GeoComply’s toolkit in the future, the PlayPause system will be offering the following solutions according to the statement on its official website;

• Increase the protective self-exclusion protection so that players can continue enjoying the same protection even when they move from one state to another
• Offer consumers a chance to self-exclude themselves in several gambling-legal states to prevent the loophole of merely crossing a state border and continuing with gambling.
• Strengthen the responsible gaming programs of enlisted operators and allow them to make more data-driven decisions. i.e., through the platform, operators will have better insights into self-excluded players on one state who may be tempted to cross state lines to go back to gambling.
• Through such a streamlined and integrated system, there will be a reduced administrative burden associated with the maintenance of different self-exclusion databases that are exclusively operated by individual states.

Even though Pennsylvania is the pioneer state to implement the GeoComply-powered PlayPause system, GVC Holdings was the first entity to team up with Conscious Gaming in the United States. This arrangement was reached in November as part of GVC’s Sustainability Charter that was unveiled earlier in the same month. GVC Holdings which is planning to rebrand to Entain PLC is the operator of BetMGM online casino and sportsbook applications thanks to a partnership with the famed MGM Resorts International.

GVC launched a BetMGM iGaming product in Pennsylvania last month and it plans to introduce a similarly branded sportsbook in the Keystone State in the coming weeks pending regulatory approval. On top of Pennsylvania, GVC Holdings and BetMGM offer iGaming and sportsbook services in West Virginia, New Jersey, and Nevada. Additionally, GVC-BetMGM mobile sports betting apps are also available in Colorado, Indiana, and Tennessee. With such a huge presence in the USA, it makes so much sense that GeoComply chose GVC Holdings as their first partner operator in the country.