France Leads the Way in Regulating Influencer Gambling Marketing

France has become the first country in Europe to pass a law regulating influencer marketing on social media. The new legislation threatens a two-year prison sentence and €300K fine for creating promotional content for online gambling.

The new law prohibits influencers from creating paid content promoting cosmetic surgery, marketing online sports betting sites, professional training courses, and online gambling. The legislation also requires influencers to disclose any filters used on promotional photos. All paid content must be labelled as such.

There are more than 150,000 online influencers active on social media in France today. They use their image and reputation to promote sometimes unworthy products and services purely in exchange for money.

Now, it looks like the governments of some major economies are ready to start cracking down on what is becoming prevalent unethical behaviour in the pursuit of profit.

Stéphane Vojetta, a French legislator who was behind the push to get this bill signed into law, said: "The law was passed in record time and unanimously, which shows how much support it had in both government and parliament. There was a clear understanding of the need to urgently respond to the challenge at hand."

Influencers who ignore the new rules can face a ban from all forms of social media.

Bruno Le Maire, the French economic minister, told the media back in March that the industry was important to the country but a clear framework must be implemented to protect consumers.

"It is a sector in which we believe in because it creates jobs and because it values French culture and creativity. The best way to protect it is to define a framework and rules so that in this dynamic sector, there are no profiteers, stowaways, or people who can take advantage of the weakness of certain consumers."

This shift to sign these new policies into law goes step further than the Twitch ban on certain kinds of gambling streams. Let’s how this will affect French poker streamers in the future as poker or streaming was not specifically mentioned.