Meity notifies online gaming rules

Centre on Wednesday notified long-awaited rules to operationalise Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act, effective May 1, paving the way for the sector’s digital-first regulator, ‘online gaming authority’, and setting out a “regulation-light” framework that would not require mandatory registration or prior determination/classification for most online social games.
Notably, the norms introduce a new concept of ‘user safety features’ as an enabling provision – technical, procedural, operational, behavioural or system-related safeguards appropriate to the risk profile of the game.
These include age-verification and age-gating, time restrictions, parental controls, user reporting tools, counselling support etc.
Service providers are required to disclose their “user safety features” and internal grievance mechanisms at the time of application for determination or registration. The new rules stipulate a determination litmus test, to classify whether an online game constitutes an online money game which parent Act explicitly bans.