Dr Mathieu Paapst appointed member of WODC research supervisory committee

Mathieu Paapst, assistant professor of IT Law at our Faculty, has been appointed member of the supervisory committee for the WODC study “Data collection and sharing related to online gaming research”.

Problems in the online gaming market

In 2021, the online gaming market was legalized. Since then, there have been signs of worrying developments in terms of insufficient consumer protection and addiction prevention. To better protect players from problematic playing behavior, debt and other gambling-related harm, further policy development is needed. Underlying this is the monitoring of player data.

The playing behavior of players cannot be traced over time. The provision of pseudonymized data by providers, in which players receive a fixed code without being traceable as a person, could be a solution. In connection with current legislation, however, only anonymized data from providers can be made available for research into gambling addiction.

Two goals

The WODC study “Data collection and sharing related to online gaming research’” has two goals. On the one hand, the researchers want to find out whether, how and under what conditions pseudonymized data about online gaming behavior can be made available for independent research and what the need for this is. On the other hand, the researchers want to determine what other possibilities there are for making gaming data available for independent research in the short term.

The research uses a variety of methods, including interviews and case studies. It is working toward a solution direction(s) for data processing for research.

This article was published by the Faculty of Law.