Norway’s gambling regulator is conducting a survey of how local banks block transactions involving online gambling operators the government doesn’t like.

On Wednesday, the Lotteritilsynet regulatory agency announced that it was conducting a survey of 170 banks to determine how they “stop cash premiums and deposits from illegal foreign gaming companies, and what kind of approach the banks and financial institutions have to gambling problems.”

Lotteritilsynet senior adviser Silje Sægrov Amble said the regulator wants to determine if banks’ current systems enable them to properly impede financial transfers to and from internationally licensed online gambling operators who compete with the state-run Norsk Tipping and Norsk Rikstoto monopolies.  

The regulator also wants to know what practices the banks employ if/when they detect that one of their customers is gambling with unauthorized sites and whether they inform these customers of the controversial gambling payment ban that took effect in January.