iGaming Ontario Shelved a Problem Gambling Study After Rates Came in Higher Than Expected, Star Reports

The Crown agency that runs Ontario's online market kept a prevalence study it had promised to publish confidential once the baseline came back worse than expected, according to records obtained by the Toronto Star. A privacy commissioner's order shows how hard even the redacted records were to prise out.

• iGaming Ontario (iGO) kept a problem gambling prevalence study confidential after researchers reported rates significantly higher than expected, according to records the Toronto Star obtained under freedom of information law
• Notes in the records ask whether a "gag order" was needed for the researchers, the Star reported; iGO says the study did not meet the standard required to inform policy development
• A privacy commissioner's order of 14 May 2026 found iGO in deemed refusal of a media request for the records and ordered a final access decision by 22 May
• The released records withheld the findings entirely, with iGO citing possible harm to the province's economic interests, a decision the Star is appealing
• Ontario has published no study of how its online market changed problem gambling rates, while separate research found emergency visits for gambling disorders roughly doubled after it opened

A Baseline iGaming Ontario Said It Would Share

iGaming Ontario commissioned the study in the months before Ontario opened its regulated online casino and sports betting market in April 2022, and said it would make the research public as a baseline for problem gambling that would shape its responsible gambling programme, the Toronto Star reported on 16 October in an investigation by Brendan Kennedy. Records the Star obtained under freedom of information law show executives were concerned when researchers reported problem gambling rates significantly higher than expected, and quietly decided to keep the research confidential, according to the Star.

The contract went to the Responsible Gambling Council (RGC), the charity that also runs the RG Check accreditation every Ontario operator must hold. The study was to follow the same group of people over two years in three waves, starting in February 2022, according to Yogonet's account of the Star's reporting. Undated notes described the baseline as showing "unexpected" problem gambling rates that differed significantly from other research. The findings have not been published, and none of the reporting we read states them.

iGO's 2022-23 annual report says the agency "commissioned research on igaming participation and high-risk gambling behaviour". Its 2023-24 and 2024-25 reports, on our reading, do not mention that research.

Methodology Doubts, a PR Firm and a 'Gag Order'

The dispute centred on method. The researchers used online survey panels, which can produce higher estimates than other approaches, and iGO wanted a telephone sample added in the second wave to test that, with then executive director Martha Otton's agreement, according to the reports. Iris Balodis of McMaster University and Michael Wohl of Carleton University, brought in by the RGC, told the Star their participation "was based on the explicit condition that we publish the findings of the study". They left the project after the first wave.

The records then turn to containment, as the Star describes them. In February 2023 an iGO manager sought legal advice about whether the researchers held copies of the data. Later that year iGO hired Counsel Public Affairs for "strategic planning and reactive messaging" on the study, and notes asked whether a "gag order" was needed. Notes from January 2025 record a decision the previous September not to release the report, according to NetNewsLedger's summary. The Ontario NDP says iGO cited "upcoming election considerations"; Ontario voted on 27 February 2025.

iGO said the study "did not meet the standard required to inform policy development". The RGC said its contract gave iGO ownership of the findings and control over publication. Neither disclosed what the research cost.

The Privacy Commissioner Had to Force a Decision

An order from the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario (IPC) sets out the access fight. On 16 October 2025 a media reporter, unnamed in the order, asked iGO for records on the findings of the prevalence study cited in a 4 March 2022 slide deck titled "iGaming Ontario's Responsible Gambling Program". iGO took a 60-day extension to 13 January 2026, missed it, and sought another 60 days in March. Most of its third-party consultation notices went out on 1 May, after the IPC's deadline of 30 April. In Order PO-4831 on 14 May 2026 the IPC found iGO in deemed refusal, citing "significant delays, whether intentional or not", and ordered a final access decision by 22 May.

What came out was heavily redacted. Among iGO's grounds was that release could harm the province's economic interests, the Star reported, according to Toronto Life, and the Star is appealing to the IPC for more. The Ontario NDP wants the full study, all three waves of data and a final draft from August 2024 released, along with the cost of the public relations contract. The reports we read carry no response from the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Gaming, which has overseen iGO since May 2025.

An Economic-Interests Defence Sits Badly With a Harm Study

The iGaming Ontario Act, 2024 gave iGO a statutory purpose of promoting economic development and revenue generation, according to its 2024-25 annual report, a year in which Ontarians wagered CA$82.7 billion, approximately $59 billion. Withholding a harm baseline on the ground that it could damage economic interests puts that dual mandate in a single redaction. The methodology objection deserves a hearing, because online panels do run high. But Great Britain's Gambling Commission faced the same problem and published its online survey anyway, warning that it may overstate harm. A caveat was available. Suppression was a choice.

Ontario Measures Channelisation Every Year but Not Harm

iGO and the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario publish an annual channelisation survey, and iGO publishes monthly market data, yet no official harm baseline exists. Others have filled the gap. In a January 2025 article for The Conversation, Balodis, Wohl and two colleagues set a 2018 Statistics Canada estimate of 1.1% for Ontario against a study by some of the authors, then awaiting peer review, that put the rate closer to 9% just before launch. They did not say whether it drew on iGO's data, and the measures are not directly comparable. Without a baseline, Ontario cannot show whether its market protects players or merely channels them.

The RGC's Two Roles Need Separating

The RGC accredits every operator and was the contractor on a study whose results, it says, belonged to iGO. That contract design put a harm study under the control of the market's operator. For provinces copying Ontario, including Alberta, which opened its private market in July, the lesson is that prevalence research needs an arm's-length funder and a duty to publish agreed before the data arrive.

Ontario built a market that reports its wagers to the decimal and its harm not at all. The Star's appeal may yet force the findings out; the province could simply publish them.