Ontario’s licensed online casinos couldn’t use FINTRAC’s web portal to file any suspicious transaction reports between March 2024 and March 2025 following a hacking incident.

Business and technology publication The Logic reported that the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada’s portal, which is how Ontario operators submit their reports, was taken down by FINTRAC following a cyberattack in March 2024.  The report notes that the portal is mainly used by small businesses; banks and most other large organizations use a secure data feed for filing reports, but iGaming Ontario (iGO) has allegedly not set up that avenue.

iGO spokesperson Josh Elliott told Canadian Gaming Business that during the FINTRAC system down time, it continued to administer its AML program according to federal legislation, reporting and taking action to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing.

All reporting entities nationwide were affected by the outage, not only iGaming Ontario. Operators and other businesses were left unable to report suspected money laundering or other suspected fraudulent activity.

iGO gave operators access again in March 2025 after FINTRAC completed an update of its tech systems and restored access. FINTRAC stated that the attacker didn’t transfer any sensitive data, per The Logic.

iGO building own automated system

Currently, authorized online gaming operators in Ontario must file suspicious transaction reports manually and upload them one at a time on a per-incident basis via the FINTRAC portal, although they do have the option to use their own in-house automation technology to speed up the process.

Elliott confirmed to CGB that the conduct-and-manage agency is building its own improved and automated system for filing such reports, one that “will accommodate the wide range of operators who will use it while also protecting the security and confidentiality of the information we report to FINTRAC.”

“Our aim is that this system will improve efficiency and speed while also remaining secure and reducing the administrative burden on operators,” said Elliott in an email. “When complete, this system will allow iGaming Ontario to file reports to FINTRAC via secure data feed, much as other high-volume entities do.

“This is a complex project, as it requires integration with our approximately 50 different operators and their individual systems. We do not have a launch date to share at this time.”

In the meantime, iGO has told operators that they may use alternative data inputting methods such as automated bots or other solutions, provided they meet iGO’s AML requirements as the reporting entity.

iGO has submitted 80K reports to FINTRAC

Some 49 licensed commercial operators are active in the Ontario market as of May 5 and the largest of them file thousands of reports every year. Elliott said that iGO has submitted more than 80,000 reports to FINTRAC on behalf of operators since April 2022, and the agency and its contracted operator partners are working on clearing the backlog that remains.

“Given the unique nature of iGaming Ontario serving as the reporting entity for some 50 different operators, FINTRAC has not set a deadline for us to complete our backlog reporting at this time,” Elliott added.

Ontario’s commercial operators, who run a combined 84 online gambling platforms, collectively handled almost $83 billion in player activity in the 2024-25 fiscal year alone. That year ran from April 1, 2024, to March 31, 2025; for almost the entirety of that period, FINTRAC’s outage meant they could not file suspicious activity reports.

Observers suggest Canadian gambling has a wider fraud problem

The CGA has made anti-money laundering a core issue of its advocacy. It noted in its 2024 Advocacy Policies that one of its goals for last year was to “actively participate” in the parliamentary review of the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act (PCMLTF Act) to ensure Canada’s AML laws and regulations can keep up with the evolution of online gambling.

Last October, a report from TransUnion Canada found that online gambling is the most susceptible sector in the country when it comes to digital fraud attempts, and the rate of instances within Canadian-specific gambling soared 79.3% year-over-year.

TransUnion Canada Head of Identity Management and Fraud Solutions Patrick Boudreau urged businesses including gambling operators to make technology such as identity verification, IP intelligence, device reputation and synthetic identity detection “critical components” of their fraud prevention programs.

In January of this year, FINTRAC publicly warned that known fentanyl traffickers were believed to be using online gambling platforms to launder money from dealing and production, disguising the deposits and withdrawals as wagering winnings.

Under its “general money laundering indicators,” FINTRAC notes that high-volume or frequent purchases from a personal account to online gambling platforms and subsequently receipt of funds into the same account from payment processors associated with online gambling platforms is “an unusual pattern” that warrants close attention.