After gaining a turnover of around $198.40 billion in 2021, the e-sports industry is further sure to mark more growth as more players are making their way to online gaming platforms. In these individuals, there is a huge number of minors as well. They see this industry as an option to earn more money and indulge in global games. In return, this ease of access is exposing children to several fraud threats.
Fake rewards, believable shell websites, and easy onboarding are grasping the attention of minors. Inadequate age checks can drive children to credit card fraud, account takeover, and gambling scams. Therefore, e-sports platforms need to integrate efficient IDV solutions to restrict their onboarding. This blog covers how age verification solutions uphold the e-gaming industry.
Benefits of Online Age Verification for the E-Sports Industry
Since sports went digital, frictionless onboarding is opening doors for minors and lax identification checks further increase their vulnerability. Without informing their patients, children indulge in adult gaming, join gambling communities, and play restricted games. Using their elders’ credit/debit card for digital payments help them avail memberships of age-oriented sites. All these tactics do not involve the approval of minors’ parents.
The ease of children’s access to e-sports sites is driving regulatory watchdogs’ concern about online gaming. They are putting forth strict age verification requirements like GDPR, COPPA, and Children’s Code. The aim behind these stringent standards is to restrict minors’ access and increase their protection against criminal exposure. Furthermore, it mandates e-sports platforms to perform enhanced age verification before player onboarding.
Traditional age checks are no more capable of identifying sophisticated efforts made by children. By camouflaging adult identities with fake documents, pictures, and information, they easily steer clear of conventional identification checks. Similarly, the long-in-use age verification methods like date of birth analysis, checkboxes, and puzzles need replacement as well.
Integrating AI-powered KYCC checks can streamline and enhance player onboarding. Solutions like liveness detection, real-time selfie-based analysis, and facial feature verification further increase the security of minors. More benefits of online age verification for e-sports platforms include:
Assures Regulatory Compliance
E-sports platforms are the easiest targets for criminals looking forward to trapping children. In wake of this, legal watchdogs are scrutinizing the gaming sector by enforcing more strict age verification regulations. Minors are valuable assets for any society and their protection against criminal threats is the utmost responsibility of every sector. Similarly, e-sports platforms should also verify age more effectively before registering a gaming account.
Online sports sites offering games for children should also increase security measures to combat external data breaches. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) act put forth by the EU makes enhancing the privacy of minors’ information a liability. For criminals, it is easier to exploit children and obtain confidential details regarding their parents as well. This requires e-sports platforms to integrate age verification solutions for enhancing data security.
AI-powered IDV services enable online gaming sites to outline their data-sharing policies and stay put with regulations. In case of non-compliance, e-sports platforms can experience hefty penalties.
Helps in Performing Social Responsibility
Societies are becoming a global villages since technologies started transforming industries’ operations. Similarly, sports have become online gaming where players can show their expertise worldwide. While this eliminates the need for physical presence, other concerns such as minors’ exposure are simultaneously upsurging. In order to play their part in social responsibility, e-sports platforms should take necessary preventive measures.
Integrating age verification online services can open doors to digital gaming sites for performing legal as well as societal roles. AI-powered IDV solutions are leveraging advanced technologies to identify players more accurately. By asking for a real-time selfie, KYCC services safeguard children from experiencing criminal schemes on e-sports platforms.
Prevents Fraud and Criminal Threats
Easy registration of children to online gaming sites is attracting criminals’ attention. By announcing instant money-making opportunities, fake rewards, and long-term earnings, fraudsters easily obtain confidential information. They further use it either to make transactions, blackmail elders regarding their child’s safety or carry out malicious activities under someone else’s name. Hence, e-sports platforms should deploy age-verification solutions to protect children from unforeseen consequences.
Key Takeaways
As rapid digitization is minimizing the need for players to be physically present for onboarding, it is raising other concerns. While driving convenience and ease of online payments, e-sports platforms are experiencing a hike in the registration of mirrors. This increases the chances of their exposure to inappropriate grouping, unethical gambling, and falling victim to blackmail. Therefore, e-sports platforms need to integrate efficient age verification solutions to protect children from online fraud risks.
