The Competition Protection Commission has imposed a fine of 310,228,000 drams (approximately $800,000) on a group of legal entities, including DigiTain LLC, Toto Sport LLC, and the Football Club Noah NGO.
According to the press service of the Competition Protection Commission, other companies, such as Soft Contract CJSC, Fast Media LLC, Fast Shift LLC, and Imagine Hub by Soft LLC, were fined 430,474,000 drams (approximately $900,000) for conducting umbrella advertising of unfair competition, particularly related to games with winnings.
The investigation revealed that DigiTain and Soft Contract used their trademarks in ways that violated the law. There were also cases of trademarks similar to those of these companies and their brand names being used to the point of confusion through affiliated companies.
Umbrella advertising was carried out on social media pages, in posts by well-known individuals ("influencers"), on payment terminal billboards, in feature films, and through other means.
"It should be noted that DigiTain and Soft Contract acknowledged the infringement and cooperated with the commission, providing data that was crucial for the investigation. The companies have been given a month to rectify the identified violations," the statement reads.
Earlier, BMG, citing data from the State Revenue Committee, reported that from January to August 2023, the volume of bets placed in internet winning games amounted to 3.9 trillion drams (approximately $10 billion). This figure is a record compared to previous years: during the same period in 2019, bets totaled 658 billion drams (over $1.5 billion), in the first eight months of 2020 - 1.2 trillion drams (over $3 billion), in 2021 - 2.3 trillion drams (about $6 billion), and in 2022 - 3.7 trillion drams (about $9.8 billion).
