Online Casinos in Turkey

Online Casino Play Is an Offence in Turkey

Turkey licenses no online casino. Article 52 of Decree-Law No. 320 on the National Lottery, headed Cezai Müeyyideler (criminal sanctions) and enacted in its present form by Article 40 of Law No. 7420 published in the Resmî Gazete of 9 November 2022, sets out what happens to conduct carried on without the authority or permission given by legislation or by the institutions legislation empowers.

• Operating any goods lottery, games of chance, mutual betting or similar game, or providing the place or opportunity for one to be played: three to five years' imprisonment and a judicial fine of up to ten thousand days.
• Providing access by internet or other means to such games operated abroad, so making it possible for them to be played from Turkey: four to six years' imprisonment and a judicial fine of up to five thousand days.
• Intermediating money transfers connected with such games: three to five years' imprisonment and a judicial fine of up to five thousand days.
• Advertising, or otherwise encouraging people to play such games: one to three years' imprisonment and a judicial fine of up to three thousand days.
• Playing such games, organised by third parties in physical or electronic settings: an administrative fine from five thousand to twenty thousand lira, imposed by the senior civil administrative officer of the locality.

The same article provides for premises where those offences are committed to be sealed and closed for up to three months without prior warning, for business licences to be cancelled within five working days, for confiscation of the assets used in or derived from the games under the Turkish Criminal Code, and for investigative measures under the Code of Criminal Procedure including seizure of immovable property, interception of communications, the assignment of an undercover investigator and technical surveillance.

What Is Permitted, and by Whom

Milli Piyango İdaresi Genel Müdürlüğü describes itself as a public body attached to the Ministry of Treasury and Finance, established to provide funds for activities determined by laws and presidential decrees, to arrange games of chance for cash prizes and hold draws, to grant and supervise the licence rights to games of chance either separately or in whole for set periods, and to permit and supervise non-cash lotteries of every kind.

The cash-prize games are no longer run by the administration itself. By an amendment to Additional Article 2 of Decree-Law No. 320, the licence rights to the games of chance played for cash prizes — Milli Piyango, Hemen Kazan, Sayısal Loto, Süper Loto, Şans Topu and On Numara — were granted to Türkiye Varlık Fonu A.Ş. for 49 years, and under the contract between that fund and the contractor Sisal Şans İnteraktif Hizmetler ve Şans Oyunları Yatırımları A.Ş. those games were taken over by the contractor on 1 August 2020. The administration stopped organising them at the end of July 2020 and no longer pays their prizes. It began non-cash goods lottery draws on 21 June 2021, and its monitoring, control, oversight and inspection role came further to the fore after the licence transfer.

Blocking and Enforcement

The administration notifies the Bilgi Teknolojileri ve İletişim Kurumu, under Law No. 5651 on the regulation of publications on the internet and combating crimes committed through such publications, so that access is blocked to websites running illegal games. It reports that in its activity period from 1 January 2024 to 31 December 2024 it examined and investigated 232,899 websites and reported content amounting to the offence of providing the place and opportunity for gambling, and that through complaints and 60 administrative decisions taken under Article 8(14) of Law No. 5651 it secured the blocking of access to 219,692 illegal games of chance sites in total. Where identities and money transfers are established, its legal advisory office files criminal complaints with the public prosecutor's offices, and the administration may apply directly to a chief public prosecutor's office where evidence of an Article 52 offence is found; it is admitted as an intervening party in prosecutions brought.

Help With Gambling Problems

The Yeşilay Danışmanlık Merkezi advice line, 115, covers gambling alongside tobacco, alcohol, substance and technology addiction, and offers free psychological and social support both to people affected and to those close to them. Milli Piyango İdaresi's own responsible gaming policy statement says it arranges the games within its remit so as not to create addiction, not to encourage excessive play and not to appeal to people of a young age, and that games of chance carry no guarantee of a return and are not an alternative to work or a source of income.

What Is Available Instead

State-licensed games of chance, run through a licence rather than a free market. The licence rights to the cash-prize games — Milli Piyango, Hemen Kazan, Sayısal Loto, Süper Loto, Şans Topu and On Numara — were granted to Türkiye Varlık Fonu A.Ş. for 49 years and passed to the contractor Sisal Şans on 1 August 2020, with Milli Piyango İdaresi keeping the monitoring, supervision and inspection role. None of it is an online casino.