Online gambling participation in the Netherlands has grown by 20% over the past two years, despite the government denying its citizens a legal gambling opportunity.

New figures released by independent research and consultancy agency Motivaction International show that an estimated 1.86m Dutch citizens – in a population of only 17m – had engaged in some form of unauthorized online gambling for money at some point in 2018.

The 2018 figure represents a more than 300k increase in the number of online gamblers since Motivaction last surveyed the market in 2016. Motivaction estimates that the total unauthorized online market was worth €592m last year, essentially flat from 2016’s figure, and from which the Dutch government earns exactly nothing.

The survey, which queried over 15k respondents between the ages of 18 and 80 last November, was commissioned by state-owned land-based casino monopoly Holland Casino. Roughly 38% of these respondents copped to gambling of some form, while 18% admitted gambling online.