One of the reasons crypto adoption in iGaming is increasing is its fast transactions, borderless Blockchain, and low fees.
Speed in moving money improves convenience. Low fees save you money while borderless transactions help improve access to mobile sportsbooks.
Blockchain benefits online betting are great, Blockchain’s ability to improve fairness is attracting the attention of key decision-makers in iGaming.
In this article, we’ll delve deeper into Blockchain’s benefits to crypto sports betting sites. Precisely, we’ll analyze how it enhances transparency, trust, and fairness. Let’s dive right in.
Here are 6 ways of blockchain benefits online betting:
1. Blockchain is a Transparent Ledger of Records
Blockchain is a decentralized ledger that records every transaction permanently. Data is recorded in blocks. Blocks are layered in chains so that you can track payments on a blockchain chronologically.
Unlike most ledgers, Blockchain stores data immutably. This means no one can alter it. People around the world can access data stored on this system. They just can’t change it.
Immutability means you can share all sorts of records without the risk that someone could change the information. In sports betting, transparency can help you trace all payments done to a sportsbook.
Beyond payments, Blockchain technology allows you to verify a bookmaker’s licensing information, bonus policies, or even its virtual games. If the company is built on the blockchain, you can verify crucial features about its fairness.
2. Self-Executing Contracts
Self-executing contracts are automated contracts applied only after certain conditions have been met. In the online betting space, smart contracts can allow you to place bets on sites you don’t necessarily trust.
Let’s say you just spotted a new bookmaker with excellent football odds. However, it’s not a popular sportsbook. Traditionally, you would avoid such a betting site in favor of a more popular operator.
With smart contracts, you don’t need to worry about a sportsbook’s reputation. You just need to care about its odds well enough that you’re willing to place a real money bet.
Your stake is held in a smart contract until a match is over. If it’s a win for you, the smart contract sends you your stake plus profits. If it’s a loss, the money goes to the bookmaker. The contract can’t be corrupted for any reason.
Online businesses around the world have been using smart contracts since 2015. However, sportsbooks are yet to adopt the feature fully. That could change in a few years, though, now that bettors are demanding increased transparency and fairness.
3. Provably Fair Games
If you bet on virtual games, you’ve probably questioned the fairness of different games. Sometimes these games can be brutal. Yet, you can prove their fairness because your sportsbook can’t allow it.
Blockchain allows you to check the fairness of any game created on a decentralized platform. As mentioned, everything recorded on a public blockchain is viewable by everyone.
That includes gaming algorithms of popular slots, card games, and simulated sports betting games. If a game uses an RNG algorithm to produce winners, you can check this algorithm for fairness.
Precisely, you can look at a game’s seed phrase—the key used to trigger winning features. By providing a way to prove fairness, Blockchain is revolutionizing online betting irrevocably.
Everyone wants to play fair games. As such, the industry has no choice but to embrace blockchain-built games.
4. Peer-to-Peer Transactions
Another way blockchain benefits online betting is that blockchain supports peer-to-peer transactions. This increases payment speed. It lowers fees and eliminates the need for payment limits. Transaction speeds vary from one blockchain to another.
For example, Bitcoin confirms a payment within 10 minutes on average. Ethereum does it in five minutes. Some blockchains—Ripple and Solana—can confirm a transaction within seconds.
Blockchain benefits online betting in that most blockchains allow you to view your transaction’s progress. This is a part of crypto’s transparency. After you’ve initiated a payment, you can track its progress.
Being able to trace payments is especially helpful in times when there’s an unusual delay. This happens to Bitcoin occasionally. The demand to approve payments can be so high that you might doubt its reliability.
However, if you can check the system and confirm that all payments are being processed accordingly, you won’t have trust issues. To be clear, most blockchains don’t suffer from long delays and downtimes. They process payments reliably.
5. Ironclad Security
Every article about Blockchain seems to confirm one thing—this technology is highly secure. It is decentralized, meaning the power to control the system is distributed across multiple computer nodes.
If you wanted to hijack the blockchain, you would need to break every computer node linked to the blockchain. Not only would this be expensive, but it would also be futile.
Secondly, blockchain benefits online betting in, that everything on the system is secured using cryptography. This minimizes the chance that a bad character could trace a crypto payment back to you. It is not impossible, though.
The FBI has arrested many people who felt safe doing illegal business using Bitcoin. That said, some cryptocurrencies can hide your identity completely. ZCash and Monero are excellent examples.
Blockchain’s security is one of the reasons for its transparency. If it were vulnerable to attacks, people would already have found ways to corrupt it. Instead, it is tamp-proof, which helps keep records transparent.
6. Compliance and Accountability
Another way blockchain benefits online betting is that it helps operators comply with regulators. The blockchain can actually improve compliance by providing a platform in which different sportsbooks record the same data.
Bookies can collect identification information for their customers and add it to the blockchain. Then they could trade this data where necessary. The blockchain is secure, meaning users’ data isn’t at risk.
Additionally, it supports one-way payments only. That means it has no reversals. If you send crypto to the wrong address, you risk losing it. While this is a risk to users, it is beneficial to online gambling companies.
For a long time, online betting sites have been losing money to credit card fraud. People bet with real money and later ask for chargebacks. Crypto eliminates this problem; ensuring bettors spend their money fairly.
