Plenty of people enjoy the great games offered at online casinos. They get a thrill hunting down the best bonuses they can, playing their favorite software and cashing out their winnings to their bank account to treat themselves. But one key to having an outstanding experience whilst playing at an online casino is making sure you and your sensitive information are never at risk.
That’s why we put together these helpful tips. From making sure you always use trusted payment methods such as Interac online to double checking the licensing, follow these hints to ensure you’re always safe!
Choose a trusted casino
The number one thing you need to do before you even sign up for a casino is to verify it’s a trusted operator. The most reliable way to do this is to check the licensing of the site you’re thinking of joining. You want to make sure the site holds a valid license from one of the major governing bodies in the industry. Two of the biggest are the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC), which reports to the UK Government, and the Malta Gaming Authority (MGA).
You can check to see if the site is licensed by the badges at the bottom of the casino website. It may well also be worth checking through the official licensing body themselves as well, just to be doubly sure.
Only go off of reliable reviews
Another popular way to check if the casino site is reliable is to check reviews. You want to make sure that the site you’re reading the review on is trustworthy within itself and that the reviews cover all the aspects of the casino.
Any reputable review will cover the design of the site, the bonuses they offer, the games library, payment options and more.
Check the security that’s in place
Because online gambling will have you entering not just your personal details but possibly your financial information, you need to make sure the security of the casino is airtight. It’s no good finding a casino with the best games and the most generous bonuses if there’s any chance you’ll get hacked.
To make sure your data isn’t at any risk, you need to check that the casino site uses 128-bit SSL encryption. This is the same level of security many popular banks use online and scrambles all data you enter. You can see whether or not the casino has up-to-date encryption by checking for the little padlock next to the website address bar.
Many online casinos will also allow their players to set up two-factor authentication. This will send a code to your phone every time you log in. You then enter the code on the site. This added layer of protection protects your account from anyone trying to get in and has become common practice in many industries.
Ensure there are fair games
Any fair casino game will be based on some element of luck and have a chance for players to win. Whilst this is easy to implement in real life, online gambling games use what’s known as random number generation or RNG to come up with results at random.
You want to make sure that any games you’re interested in playing have fair RNG that hasn’t been tampered with. You can find sites that have had their games audited by a third party, such as eCOGRA. The sites that have been audited will have a small badge down at the bottom, right next to the licensing badges.
Always use trusted payment options
One of the most important aspects of playing games at an online casino is getting your money into your account so you can play and your winnings out. There’s a plethora of different methods you can use to do this but you only want to be using options which are trusted, safe and that you know. Check the list of accepted payment methods to see which ones you know and trust.
Many online casinos now support big-name e-wallets such as PayPal and Interac, as well as other well-known payment providers. You can take this a step further and use prepaid cards such as PaySafeCard, with some casinos even supporting cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Test out the customer support
Finally, if anything does happen you want to be extra sure that it’s going to be resolved fast and efficiently. Time is of the essence if there’s any sort of data breach, so you want to test out the response times of the customer support at the casino to make sure they answer your questions promptly.
The online casino should also have multiple ways you can contact them, including email, phone support and live chat.
Conclusion
Follow our simple hints when looking to join an online casino to stay safe and start your casino gaming off to a great start. All of these steps will only take you a few minutes but could save you a massive headache in the future!