While unregulated casinos offer betting opportunities to Iranians and the country's visitors, those casinos are not licensed or authorized by the government. Since 1979, online gambling has been illegal in Iran. However, increasing reports of Iranian gambling has the Central Bank imposing more robust controls on online payments since 2019. Local press quote CBI's Mehran Moharramian, dep. governor new technologies, about his efforts to block gambling-related payments.
These new measures have curtailed online betting transactions by 60 percent, according to Moharramian. However, online casino websites continue to target Iranian gamblers. Setting up a gambling account on a website located outside Iran is simple. One reason the websites have evaded Iranian authorities is that there are many ways to process digital payments online. CBI is not taking the uptick in Iranian gambling lightly, blocking 8,000 plus pos terminals, which were on Iran's payment network but operating from nearby countries. Still, many operators who are shut down simply switch to other money transfer methods for gambling deposits and withdrawals.
Enforcement
As a result, Iran also focuses on debit card users. More than 20,000 cards have been linked to suspected gambling activity. According to regulators, the CBI is placing stricter limits on the transfer of funds person to person. Even with government oversight in the financial section, Iran's gambling ban is tough to enforce.