Cambodia Says 24 Casinos Have Shut Down Online Gambling and Removed the Equipment

Cambodia's anti-scam commission says inspectors confirmed that 24 casinos in three provinces ended livestreamed gaming, football betting and online lotteries by the 30 September deadline and moved the equipment out. It has not said how many casinos were running online operations in the first place.

• Twenty-four casinos, 12 in Preah Sihanouk, seven in Banteay Meanchey and five in Svay Rieng, have ended all online gambling and online betting after the 30 September deadline, according to the secretariat of Cambodia's anti-scam commission
• Inspectors working with the Commercial Gambling Management Commission of Cambodia (CGMC) and provincial authorities say the sites stopped livestreamed gaming, football betting, online lotteries and "sporting bird" competitions, and dismantled and removed the equipment used to run them
• The commission says all online gambling and betting, inside or outside casino premises, is now banned outright and that breaches will be dealt with "without exception or leniency", confirming that the October shutdown is permanent
• Separately, 18 casinos have lost their licences and nine have been suspended over links to scam operations, with the commission seeking to freeze and seize the owners' and shareholders' assets
• The statement covers three provinces only and does not say how many casinos were running online operations before the deadline, or whether casinos elsewhere have been inspected

Inspectors Confirm the First Wave of Compliance

Cambodia's government says the first casinos have complied with its order to stop running online betting from their premises. In a statement published on 1 October, reported by the state news agency Agence Kampuchea Presse and carried in full by the state broadcaster TVK, the secretariat of the Ad Hoc Commission for Combating Online Scams (CCOS), which the Phnom Penh Post translates as the Commission for Combating Technology-enabled Scams, said that 24 casinos had ended "all operations and business activities of online gambling and online betting of every kind" after the ultimatum expired on 30 September. Twelve are in Preah Sihanouk province, home to Sihanoukville, seven in Banteay Meanchey, which includes the border town of Poipet, and five in Svay Rieng. The statement does not name them.

The findings come from inspections by the secretariat's law enforcement officers, working with the CGMC and the provincial unified command committees, with procedural coordination from the provincial courts. According to the statement, the 24 sites ended all livestreaming of gambling, football betting, online lottery recording and "sporting bird" competitions, and dismantled and transported the equipment that served the online business entirely off the premises.

That is what "halt" means in practice: not a licence change but the physical removal of the studios and terminals that let casinos stream table games and take bets from players who were not in the building. Cambodia stopped issuing online gambling licences in 2019, but authorities found that some casinos continued to exploit loopholes to run online betting, which is what the October order was designed to close.

A Ban With No Exceptions, Backed by Monitoring

The secretariat said that from the deadline onward, all online gambling or online betting "in every form, both inside and outside casino premises, is absolutely prohibited". Authorities will keep monitoring the inspected sites and other locations "in other provinces throughout the country", and violations will be met with legal action "without exception or leniency", it said.

The licence consequences were set out in September. Interior Minister Sar Sokha said casinos that breached the order faced revocation of their licences and other legal action, and Prime Minister Hun Manet said on 16 September that the shutdown "is not a temporary measure", according to the Khmer Times; the same day he said casinos involved in online betting would not have their licences renewed, the Cambodia-China Times reported. What remains legal is land-based play by customers who are physically present. Pailin's governor, Ban Sreymom, told the eight casino companies in her province in September that casino operations would be permitted only for customers who physically visit the premises, the Khmer Times reported.

The Scam Crackdown Runs Alongside It

The statement separates the online gambling halt from the anti-scam campaign, under which, as of September, 18 casinos linked to technology-enabled scams have had their licences revoked and nine more have been suspended while investigators gather evidence before a final decision. The secretariat says it is working with the CGMC, judicial police, provincial prosecutors and courts and the Cambodia Financial Intelligence Unit to detain, freeze and confiscate the assets of the owners or shareholders of the casino companies involved. It says it has cleared more than 600 scam locations nationwide.

Those counts differ from the figures reported in August, when the government said 20 licences had been revoked and 29 suspended; the statement does not reconcile them. The Khmer Times published the names of the 18 revoked casinos in September, among them Shang Hai Resort, Casino Ying Huang and several Jin Bei properties. The Phnom Penh Post noted that the secretariat did not say whether any of the 24 casinos that ended online gambling were among those revoked or suspended, and that there was no allegation that the 24 were involved in scams.

Twenty-Four Is a Count of Compliance, Not a Measure of It

The figure has no denominator. The statement does not say how many casinos were running online operations before the deadline, so 24 could be every one of them or a fraction. It covers three provinces. It does not mention Pailin, where eight casino companies were told to stop by the same date, or Phnom Penh, and it does not say whether casinos in other provinces had no online business to close or have simply not been inspected yet. Prime Minister Hun Manet has put the number of licensed casinos at about 100, while the Phnom Penh Post refers to almost 200. Until the government publishes a full list of inspected sites, the 24 is best read as the first wave of confirmed compliance rather than proof that casino-based online gambling has ended.

Moving the Equipment Out Does Not Move the Demand

The physical removal of streaming equipment, verified with court coordination, is a harder test than the paper ban Cambodia has had since 2019, and it puts each casino's licence on the line ahead of the renewals due around 2027. But online gambling does not need a casino floor. The Prime Minister himself warned in September that criminal groups could adapt by shifting from large compounds to smaller, decentralised operations. A ban that removes the regulated, inspectable version of a product while players in neighbouring markets still want it tends to move the activity rather than end it, and the commission's promise to keep monitoring "throughout the country" is an acknowledgement that the next operations will not be in buildings with a licence on the wall.

The Casinos That Remain Are Being Asked to Prove Their Good Standing

For the licensed land-based casinos, the October deadline is the first of several tests. The CGMC is drafting a suitability framework for renewals, the IMF has said both the legal framework and the actual vetting of casino owners are "similarly deficient", and the Prime Minister has said there are too many casinos and that operators must now meet a capital requirement of up to $100 million. Each casino that has removed its online equipment has cleared the first hurdle. Whether it clears the next will depend on criteria the regulator has yet to publish.

Cambodia has shown it can send inspectors in and take the equipment out. Showing the rest of the market, and the IMF, that the gambling it still licenses is clean is the harder part.