Brazil Study Flags 802 Instagram Accounts Sharing Betting Links

LegitBet is used by the National Association of Games and Lotteries (ANJL) to monitor suspected illegal betting promotions. Brazil banned fixed-odds betting and its advertising on September 25. The Instagram posts examined by LegitBet appeared after the ban.

October Scan Found 396 Affiliate-Style Links

VEJA published the study on November 9. On October 27, LegitBet checked 908 Instagram accounts in 85 minutes. Betting links appeared on 626 of them.

That scan also uncovered 500 new web addresses. According to BNLData, 396 had URL patterns associated with affiliate marketing. That’s 79.2% of the new addresses, calculated by 15M from the reported figures. The classification was based on link patterns rather than commission records.

The Same Link Appeared on 86 Profiles

One betting URL was found across 86 Instagram accounts. Nearly 74% of the 802 flagged profiles advertised betting sites more than once during the study period.

Most had relatively modest followings. Accounts with 10,000 to 100,000 followers made up 73% of the group, while 23.6% had between 100,000 and one million.

ANJL president Plínio Lemos Jorge pointed to the risk of minors encountering these promotions. "Instagram allows teenagers to open accounts from age 13," he said, in a statement translated from Portuguese.

The restrictions have also affected paid advertising on other platforms. In October, 15M reported TikTok’s revised gambling ad rules for Brazil.

Justice Ministry Seeks 348 Account Removals

On November 9, Brazil’s Justice Ministry requested the removal of 348 Instagram profiles promoting illegal betting. Their combined follower counts exceeded 150 million. One account had 1.4 million followers, according to the ministry’s announcement.

Since September 25, government monitoring has identified 51,611 betting websites and more than 900 Instagram profiles. The ministry’s figures cover a longer period than the LegitBet study.