Cyberhorizon the digital office hosting service has been an issued a 140,000 pounds (€167,297/$183,576) penalty by the Isle of Man gambling supervision Commission for breaching rules on anti money laundering and counter terrorist financing
The Isle of Man Regulator carried out a supervisory investigation of Cyberhorizon and discovers that they had several breaches. The company had a license in the Isle of Man between 5 March 2021 and 25 September 2023.
In June 2023 an investigation was in process and it was discovered that the company breached the Gambling Code 2019 (Anti-Money laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism). These focused on regularly reviewing its customer risk assessment by Cyberhorizon.
What services CyberHorizon have ?
Cyberhorizon is a provider of a video-based office platforms to clients. These serve as a virtual office for teams to use a range of built in tools for collaboration.
It’s not clear if Cyberhorizon had or has clients from the Gambling Industry , their site doesn’t mention anything.
Cyberhorizon mistake?
Cyberhorizon failed to fully implement a risk assessment technology before it launched, according to GSC. They also failed to close customer relationships after such users did not provide due diligence or meet certain requirements.
GSC also said that Cyberhorizon did not set out how records could be retrieved after the license cessation.
Following this, the Isle of Man regulator considered the breaches to be worthy of a penalty. Initially this was set at £200,000 but reduced after cyberhorizon cooperated to £140,000
Cyberhorizon Criticized over “serious” breaches
GSC released a post-settlement statement on Fryday (4 October) in which they stated that the penalty reflected the seriousness of the case.
“The Commission is satisfied that the imposition of the civil penalty on CyberHorizon reflects the serious nature of the non-compliance and issues identified,” the GSC said.
“We are also satisfied that the directors of CyberHorizon, at this time, recognize and accept that there had been certain shortcomings in that mandatory aspects of the code had not been complied with.
GSC issued a warning for the other providers, and advised them to take note of the breaches and to ensure they operate withing regulations line.
“All firms undertaking business in the regulated gambling sector have an obligation to conduct their affairs in a manner that adequately identifies and mitigates,” the GSC said. “This includes, among other things, the money laundering and terrorist financing risks faced by it.”
The GSC warned it would exercise its powers “robustly” when it identifies material risk to its regulatory objectives, to uphold the Isle of Man’s reputation as a “a responsible and well regulated, jurisdiction”
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