Guide · 6 min

How to read a gambling licence without the seal fooling you

Updated 29 August 2026

A licence is a sentence with a number, a legal name, and a register you can open. A gold crest is a picture. Casinos know most people stop at the picture. The work is the sentence.

On the UK Gambling Commission register you are looking for a legal entity — Jumpman Gaming Limited, Betway Limited — and a remote operating licence. The account number (39175, 39372) is the handle. The longer string (039175-R-319452-025, 039372-R-319367-029) is the current remote licence. If the brand in the header does not match the company in the register, you are looking at a skin. That is allowed. It is also how twenty URLs share one complaints desk.

White-label B2B licences get quoted as if they were the casino you deposited with. They are not. A platform provider’s certificate does not automatically give you an ADR against the consumer-facing brand. If the T&Cs name a different company from the footer seal, believe the T&Cs and then decide whether to stay.

Malta numbers should resolve on the MGA’s public tools. Curaçao numbers should resolve to a named licensee under the current regime, not a 2018 PDF on a forgotten CDN. Kahnawake has a commission site. Anjouan often has a seal and little else. CasinoSec’s Canada directory leaves the number blank when we cannot show one. That blank is information.

Watch for cross-geo reuse. A UKGC string on a Canadian review is a copy-paste error or a deception. Jackpot City UK is Betway Limited. Jackpot City Canada is a different dest and a different file. We print that twice because players lose money on the mix-up.

Expired certificates stay on websites longer than they stay valid. If a register search returns surrendered, suspended, or nothing, do not take the footer’s word. Screenshots of old licences are a genre.

A licence does not set your stake. It sets who you can write to. If you cannot name the licensee after two minutes, you do not have a licence in any useful sense. Close the tab and keep the two minutes.