New York’s gaming regulator has unanimously advanced a rule that would sharply restrict the use of artificial intelligence and automated profiling to tailor sportsbook promotions, betting advice and product recommendations to individual customers.
The proposal would bar licensees and firms acting for them from using AI, machine learning, generative systems or other automated decision tools to process a patron’s data in order to select, customise, time or deliver bonuses, offers, odds, betting limits, messages or recommendations. It would also prohibit systems from suggesting a wager, wager type or amount where the purpose or foreseeable effect is to increase betting, engagement or revenue.
The restrictions would apply more widely than New York’s nine mobile sports-betting operators, according to RG.org. Casinos, platform providers, video lottery agents, racetracks, off-track betting corporations, account-wagering providers and lottery courier services would also be covered.
A human review of an automated recommendation would not create an exemption. Nor would a customer’s consent, except for a narrow horse-racing provision. Offers, odds or wager suggestions that differ between patrons based on their individual data would be presumed to breach the rule unless an operator could show, with clear and convincing evidence and supporting logs, that the variation arose solely from published objective criteria.
Uniform promotions available to all eligible customers under published criteria would remain permitted. The draft also allows systems used exclusively for fraud prevention, anti-money-laundering work, age verification and responsible-gambling interventions intended to reduce wagering. Sportsbook promotion criteria could not rely on a customer’s wagering history, spending, losses or inferred vulnerability, apart from volume-based loyalty tiers.
Operators would have to catalogue all systems that process individual data, keep logs for at least seven years, allow audits and give 30 days’ notice of material system changes. Chief executives would be required to certify compliance annually. Each affected customer could constitute a separate violation, with sanctions potentially including fines, suspension or licence revocation.
Horse-racing licensees would retain a limited route to offer a wager-suggestion app. Customers would have to opt in independently, the tool could use only the customer’s own pari-mutuel betting history, and it could not include promotions or serve self-excluded customers. Consent would default to off and require renewal at least every 12 months.
The commission revised an earlier version after industry feedback. CDC Gaming reported that the revised approach drew on a New Jersey regulation that does not ban the technology outright. The proposals grew out of Gov. Kathy Hochul’s 2026 State of the State agenda on underage gambling, marketing to at-risk customers and gambling addiction, and followed a New York Times investigation into DraftKings’ use of machine learning for promotional targeting.
The proposed AI restrictions would add specific controls to existing New York advertising rules. The commission already treats promotional activity as advertising and bars licensees and sports-pool vendors from advising individual patrons to make a specific wager, while prohibiting promotions that encourage excessive gambling, chasing losses or misleading vulnerable groups.
The commission advanced a separate at-risk-bettor rule at the same meeting. The Sports Betting Alliance said it would continue working with regulators to ensure the proposals strengthen New York’s regulated market.
Both proposals have entered a 60-day public-comment period before returning to the commission for discussion and a possible final vote. No date has been set for that vote.
