Sweden Bans Duel.com Operator Immortal Snail After It Refuses To Drop Swedish

Sweden’s gambling regulator has ordered Immortal Snail LLC, the company behind duel.com, to stop offering gambling in Sweden with immediate effect, after a follow-up check found the site still showed Swedish and Swedish kronor to players logging in from Sweden.

Spelinspektionen has banned duel.com operator Immortal Snail LLC from offering gambling in Sweden without a license, after the company told the regulator it would not stop offering Swedish on its website.

The Swedish Gambling Authority announced the ban on October 28, 2026, the same day it took the decision. It published a second ban that day against Lufilight Ltd, the company it says runs the Ivibet, Hellspin and Slotsgem brands. Both decisions apply immediately.

What Spelinspektionen found on duel.com

According to the four-page decision (case number 26Si2185), the regulator opened a supervisory case after suspecting that Immortal Snail was offering gambling aimed at the Swedish market through duel.com without the required license. It carried out a covert test purchase on the site, although that purchase was not completed.

Its review of duel.com found three things. Swedish appeared as a language when choosing payment methods, the Swedish krona (SEK) could be selected as a currency for payments, and the site was being marketed through Swedish-language websites aimed at Swedish consumers. The regulator also found nothing to show that Swedish consumers were prevented from registering and opening an account.

The decision identifies Immortal Snail LLC as a company registered in Charlestown, Nevis, in the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis. It notes that duel.com states the company holds license number ALSI-202411026-FI1 on Anjouan, in the Union of the Comoros. After an overall assessment, the regulator concluded that the company provides gambling aimed at the Swedish market and has no license to do so in Sweden.

The ban was decided by unit head Robert Larsson after a presentation by investigator Nikolas Tsoros. Citing consumer protection, Spelinspektionen said it was important that the decision be complied with immediately, which is why it takes effect at once. The decision includes information on how it can be appealed.

Immortal Snail’s response to the regulator

What sets this case apart from most Swedish bans is the operator’s reply, which the regulator summarized in its decision. In an English translation published by SBC News, the decision states: “The company has stated that Swedish is an international language and stated that Sweden as a country should be IP-blocked.”

It continues: “Furthermore, the company has stated that the company cannot control whether payments are made in the Swedish currency SEK. Finally, the company has stated that the company should not cease offering Swedish as a language on the website.”

Spelinspektionen then ran a follow-up check of duel.com on October 28. According to the same translation, that check “revealed that the IP blocking against Sweden has not been implemented.” The regulator added: “The Swedish currency SEK and Swedish as a language still appear when logging in from a Swedish IP address.” It also said it had “noted continued Swedish-language marketing of the company’s website duel.com.”

Duel founder Ossi Ketola has crossed paths with the Swedish regulator before. iGaming Expert reported that he previously operated CSGOEmpire, which was prohibited from targeting Sweden in November 2023.

A second ban on the same day

The Lufilight decision (case number 26Si2241) describes a different tactic. When Spelinspektionen checked ivibet.com, hellspin.com and slotsgem.com, it found that the sites redirected to mirror sites at ivibettnow.com, hellspin222.com and gemslots1.com. Those mirror sites had Sweden and the Swedish country code +46 preselected when registering from a Swedish IP address, and the brands were being promoted through Swedish-language affiliate marketing.

The regulator said it put these findings to the company and gave it the chance to respond, but received no reply. A follow-up review found that the mirror sites had since changed domain names, while the new mirrors still had Sweden and +46 preselected and the brands were still marketed through Swedish-language websites. Again, no response came in.

According to the decision, Lufilight is listed in the Kahnawake licensing register as holding a license in Kahnawake, Canada. The regulator said it could not identify the company’s registration number, license number or address.

The two October decisions add to a steady run of bans. Spelinspektionen’s decision register shows bans against the operators of stakes.com on September 14, RBGAMING N.V. and Softon Ltd on July 9, Twocent Technology Limited on June 29, Rust Clash Entertainment Ltd on April 27 and Novatech Solutions N.V. on March 11.

Why Sweden’s targeting test is hard to enforce

Both cases turn on the same legal question. Under Sweden’s Gambling Act (2018:1138), online gambling that is not aimed at the Swedish market is not considered to be provided in Sweden, and so falls outside the law. A license is only required once a site is judged to be targeting Swedish players.

The decision explains that this is settled through an overall assessment of each case, in which Swedish text on a site or deposits and winnings in Swedish currency can be relevant factors. It also sets out the regulator’s view that if Swedish consumers are not allowed to register and open an account, the gambling cannot be considered provided in Sweden. Immortal Snail had argued that Sweden should be IP-blocked, but the regulator’s follow-up check found that no such block had been put in place.

The regulator has been open about the limits of this approach. In its 2025 report on online gambling outside the licensed market, Spelinspektionen estimated that the channelization rate was 86% in 2023, though lower for commercial online gambling. It said around 45% of traffic to unlicensed gambling sites in 2024 went to sites claiming a license from a third country, with Curaçao accounting for 38% and Anjouan for 5% of all traffic to unlicensed sites.

The same report concluded that the targeting criterion had proven difficult to apply in practice, noting that the burden of proof lies with the regulator. It described a gray zone in the market that also limits its ability to use other tools, including restricting or stopping payments.

Spelinspektionen is also under pressure from licensed operators over how it supervises them. Trade body BOS commissioned a legal comparison of the authority with other Swedish regulators, and secretary general Gustaf Hoffstedt told iGaming Business that the regulator is “more heavy-handed and less focused on dialogue or collaborative problem-solving” than its peers.

Europe’s wider push against offshore operators

Sweden is not acting alone. On October 22, the Netherlands’ Kansspelautoriteit fined EOD Code SRL €37 million for offering gambling without a license across 12 websites, including Instantcasino. The Dutch regulator said it chose a turnover-related amount because it estimated the company had earned more from Dutch players’ stakes than its standard fines would capture, and described the penalty as its highest yet for illegal gambling. EOD Code also appears in Spelinspektionen’s register, which lists a Swedish ban against the company dated May 12, 2025.

Dutch trade body VNLOK has taken a different route, suing Meta over illegal gambling ads on Facebook and Instagram. In Britain, the government’s Illegal Gambling Taskforce is focused on black market payments and advertising, and the government has proposed banning unlicensed gambling sponsors from 2027.

The UK’s licensed industry has repeatedly linked higher taxes to black market growth. The Betting and Gaming Council has cited forecasts that illegal operators will keep growing.

The trade body has also pointed to other countries’ experience when warning about the risks of tighter rules and higher taxes.

The table below sets out the recent enforcement steps covered in this article.

What happens next

Both Swedish bans are already in force, and both companies can appeal under the instructions attached to the decisions. Neither decision sets out further measures beyond the ban itself.

Whether the orders change anything in practice will depend on how the companies respond. Immortal Snail had told the regulator it would not stop offering Swedish, and Lufilight did not answer the regulator at all, moving its mirror sites to new domains during the investigation. iGaming Expert reported claims from Sweden that the sites were still reachable via VPNs on the night of the ban.

For operators holding Swedish licenses, the duel.com case is a clear example of the competition they face from sites outside the system. For Spelinspektionen, it is a test of how far a ban can reach when the operator openly disputes it.

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