What Happened
A player from Austria says Whale.io banned them under section 15 of its terms the day after they placed near the top of a refer-a-friend tournament, with about 1,700 USDT of prize money and balance on the account. They had been verified for months and had been paid for an earlier tournament. Whale.io says the referred account's sign-up and deposit pattern was an attempt to game the promotion.
How It Developed
- 2025-10-11Complaint opened. The player could no longer log in, so had no game history to share.
- 2025-11-21Whale.io told the thread the account was permanently closed for abusing the refer-a-friend tournament; the mediator asked for evidence.
- 2025-12-01The casino declined to share its evidence, citing GDPR; the mediator had the player file a data request, and the casino then went quiet.
- 2025-12-27The case was marked unresolved and the player was pointed to the Anjouan regulator.
- 2026-09-17Reopened: Whale.io restated its decision, exchanged emails with a new resolver, and on 19 October said it cannot hand over evidence that includes the referred person's data, but would give the full file to the regulator.
- Waiting for the player's reply.
Ongoing
Reopened in September 2026; Whale.io stands by the ban but says privacy law stops it sharing its evidence with the mediator.
What Has (and Hasn't) Helped
Nothing yet: after a year the casino still will not show the mediator its evidence, only the regulator. If a referral case stalls like this, the Anjouan Gaming Authority is the only body the casino says it will open its file to.