Question about Gambling websites with Curaçao license using incorrect Merchant Category code (strana 854)

Thanks for raising this and for contributing to such an important debate. And also thank you for the kind words about me and Jaro, we really appreciate it.

Now to the point. I fully understand that for some players, the licensing status of a casino is the key concern. And that’s absolutely fair. However, the way our Safety Index is built reflects a broader perspective. A weak or missing license results in a penalty, yes, but it doesn’t automatically define the entire score.

What weighs more heavily in our system is how the casino actually behaves in practice. Licensing is, at the end of the day, just a piece of paper. It may set a legal baseline, but what really matters is how the people behind the casino treat players. Whether they apply rules consistently. Whether they resolve issues fairly. That’s what shows their true character, not necessarily the logo on the bottom of their homepage.

If you check what drives the Safety Index score, you’ll notice that license isn’t even listed among the key positives in this case:

Very big operation based on our research and estimates

Fair terms and conditions

Not blacklisted by any major source

Very few or no complaints relative to the casino’s size

A few other factors that had a slightly negative impact

I get that in the context of this thread, our rating might feel out of sync with what some of you expected, and that’s perfectly okay.

In the end, it’s up to every player to decide where they want to play or if they want to play at all.

So once again, if you don’t play at casinos that operate outside of local regulations, you won’t have to deal with any questionable third-party payment processors, I guess.

Though I suspect the real point here is not to play at all.

"Fair terms and conditions"

Ill list shortly a list of their terms and the legal basis that they are unenforceable in any jurisdiction- would this help? Its already been through courts.

"Not blacklisted by any major source"

You must be joking right? This group have have literal government's sending them cease and desist orders and have had formal removals from searches in a large number of EU countries because they are targeting citizens of said countries illegally. Evidence is widely available.

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Ill provide more info later - I hired an Investigator for them so have a lot of detail

Thanks for the added context, I get that this is something you’ve clearly looked into.

But just to be super clear, the Safety Index has never been about who sued who, which court said what, or which government filed a complaint. That’s not what it was built for. What we care about is what actually happens between a casino and its players.

So when we say "fair terms," we don’t mean that every sentence is legally bulletproof. We mean that the casino doesn’t twist those terms to stupidly deny withdrawals or hold onto winnings unfairly. We look at what happens in real life, not in theory.

The same applies to blacklists. We track the ones relevant to the gambling community. We don't focus on search engine bans or regulatory issues, as they typically reveal more about the casino's operations rather than its player treatment.

For example, has this casino made life harder for a Portuguese player trying to verify their account and withdraw through a PayPal account? Has it blocked payouts for sketchy reasons? If yes, we’d reflect that after careful examination of the concrete situation. That's the main relation between our complaint section and the Safety Index.

So yeah, you might be totally right that there’s a legal mess in the background. But unless it trickles down into how the casino deals with players, it doesn’t really affect the Safety Index. That’s the whole idea.

Hello again,

I think this merchant is used for multiple casino operators as I never used Santeda only because it's restricted for my country.

Few months ago I used a casino where multiple transactions went under Niko*MarineBeauty,but unfortunately I cannot remember which casino it was - I don't have any evidence left. 😞

The reality is that anyone who is wronged by the casino receives the dreaded copy and paste email with terms attached that are not legally enforceable anywhere in the world.

I am to the point I have all the info on this company - I know who the owners are and what they do and the specific transactional pyramids they setup. Obviously not going to post it here as its a legal matter but there is clear identifiable evidence of money laundering on an industrial scale. If your content promoting this site and their group then so be it but be warned you may be made to look silly when the dust settles on this. They can also come on at anytime and discuss this - happy to openly discuss it with them but they won't...they will hide away like they always do such as when you copy Europol and Payment Processors like Mastercard into conversations with them- they suddenly become completely silent.

Well, as I’ve explained several times, the Safety Index is not designed to evaluate legal disputes, speculation about financial practices, or unverified information. It’s based on real player experiences and verified data about how casinos actually handle payouts, complaints, and rules in practice. What we have witnessed during complaints. That's a different perspective than yours. I believe that's the matter.

After all the details I’ve discussed here, it’s hard to see any form of ‘promotion’ of this casino or their group in my approach. My goal is to inform players as objectively and fairly as possible, not to defend or downplay any concerns.

Who ends up being right legally will be revealed by time and facts, usually in court rather than on the Casino Guru website. That’s why I focus on what can be truly verified and what players experience firsthand in dealing with everyday casino-related situations as players.

Insights from a private investigator may be interesting material for news stories or forum discussions, but they are certainly not the basis for the Safety Index, which basically measures how casinos pay out winnings to players.

I respect your perspective, though.

I would NEVER, EVER use a card to deposit with any casino, why do you people do this??

Go with the times, crypto currencies or E wallets.

I get it - however there is no "speculation" about financial practices - some of the evidence is on the 900 odd pages of this thread. The rest is with the appropriate authorities who are under pressure now from governments around the world including the US Government.

As I said before - if you have seen this thread and continue to deposit by card anywhere then you genuinely need your head examined.

I understand your point, but on the other hand, the 900 pages in this thread mostly discuss issues that arise when players engage with casinos operating outside their national licensing frameworks. For example, when deposits or withdrawals are routed through third parties or accounts not clearly linked to the casino itself, it’s often a direct consequence of playing at an unlicensed or insufficiently licensed operator from the player’s home jurisdiction.

If players stick to casinos properly licensed for their country, these complications largely don’t happen. So, ironically, this thread actually highlights how significant the problem is, mainly among players who are already vulnerable or dependent.

I get that you interpret such behavior as a form of wrongdoing or scheme, but from our perspective, the Safety Index is focused on a much more practical question: when a player wins, do they actually get paid?

That’s always been and will remain the core of the Index.

We simply don’t have the means to verify or factor into our score the legal intricacies of how casinos handle markets or what lawyers think behind the scenes. Even banks won't engage in discussion with payers, based on information in this thread. Totally out of our reach, I'm sorry.

The legality of using wrong coding on payments has been laid out many times and is openly available within the Terms and Conditions of the payment processors. We have made distinctions before - worldwide gambling is a regulated good - by deliberately masking/routing payments as a non-regulated good you are breaking the law of ANY country. Imagine it was guns or pharmaceutical drugs - imagine they decided to just say, stuff it, we will just say this is grocery shopping to avoid any problems. This is dark web stuff.

Anyway - let's agree to disagree - but I find the scoring of this particular group appalling quite frankly. This is a group who openly ignore legal letters - they think they are untouchable.

I got an email today from Guru saying ive not been on the forum in a while so just updating ive signed up to MOSES again as spending too much time in bookies mainly due to machines as was winning on placepots getting luck but its best to just stay out of them as it leads to misery and it was getting tiring for me I have not went back near these online rogues since the last episode not even a search for them still waiting on 3 chargebacks going through been about two weeks now since raised and have not heard back from the FOS looking into my objection yet I got an option to change my username as well and I have as it was a security risk

Hi! Can I please ask how you went about this?

can you help me? how can i contact you

Hi which merchant is it for?

Hi do you have info about teqcors?

I need teqcors too they have now changed name to teqcord

The merchant is niko technology they aren’t helpful niko technologies are related to active web , global stride../

I alsow need them but i cant find anythin?!