FTC Guidelines and Unregulated Video Games Casinos

Influencers are no strangers to brand partnerships. Certain influencers have gone out and started their own company and cleverly used their social prowess to garner attention towards their brand. This practice, however, can be a slippery slope. In the cases of Trevor “TmarTn” Martin and Thomas “Syndicate” Cassell, this practice nearly cost them their entire reputation.

Martin and Cassell were two prominent Counter-Strike YouTubers that achieved a massive level of success in the Summer of 2016. A large portion of this content involved videos of them doing high-stakes gambling with in-game skins. Counter-Strike, for the uninitiated, has a massive side to it that involves the buying/selling and trading of virtual “skins” for your guns. These skins can range in value from a few cents to thousands of dollars, and because of Counter-Strike’s trading system, they can be easily traded between users. In the Summer of 2016, many websites began to come into the scene to allow users to trade their skins to the site and gamble them on many casino games, such as roulette, card games, and coin flips. These sites soared in popularity, and with them, so did the number of people we're creating content surrounding the trend.

I remember this time well. I was in my senior year of high school and played hours of Counter-Strike in my free time. As my time spent in the game grew, so did my consumption of content surrounding the game. A portion of this content involved TmarTn and Syndicate videos. I remember finding it extremely entertaining to watch these lively personalities risking extremely high-value items in the hopes of making insane returns. I couldn’t afford the same level of bankroll, so it was entertaining to experience it through these YouTubers.

The obvious point of these videos was for the YouTubers to showcase these websites positively, as many of them were sponsored by the sites (generally, YouTubers would be given free skins to gamble in exchange for creating content for the site). This was somewhat understood within the viewer base. The argument can be (and has been) made that this is highly unethical. The majority of these YouTubers cater towards a much younger audience, many in the 10–18-year-old range. These YouTubers were essentially marketing full-blown casinos to an unsuspecting youth, many of whom couldn’t legally gamble.

Not only was this behavior unethical, but it was also extremely unregulated. These online casinos weren’t insured, and there was no real KYC process to ensure that those that used the site were legally allowed to gamble.

It does, sadly, get worse. Through some thorough research by a small YouTuber known as HonorTheCall, it was uncovered that TmarTn and Syndicate were actually both co-owners of CSGOLotto. It’s extremely clear why this is an issue.

Neither Martin nor Cassell had disclosed that they ran the site. It wasn’t even evident that they were sponsored, let alone owned and operated the business.

This discovery resulted in a massive fallout, with many sites falling out of business as more unethical and illegal practices were uncovered.

As for our friends TmarTn and Syndicate, in September of 2017, the FTC issued a press release on the matter announcing a settlement between themselves and the two YouTubers. They called what TmarTn and Syndicate did a “misrepresentation of independence” and called the two creators out, stating that what they did violated their endorsement standards.

This entire situation presents a cautionary tale for social media influencers across the board. According to the FTC and the general internet, influencers need to disclose their ties to the brands that they work with. Unethical behavior in this area has the chance to ruin careers and can violate the trust the exists between a content creator and their fans.