SEON has reported that World Cup betting and gaming fraud moved from registration to cash-out, with suspicious withdrawals rising 38% compared to 2025.
Fraud prevention and anti-money laundering (AML) technology company SEON has published an analysis of betting and gaming operator data collected during the 2026 FIFA World Cup, concluding that fraud pressure during the tournament concentrated at withdrawal stage rather than at registration, as is typically expected around major sporting events.
According to SEON, though as assumed, the registration volume did increase, betting and gaming operators also deliberately reduced sign-up friction to remain competitive for new players. That resulted in a 16% fall in sign-up block rates.
Suspicious withdrawal activity increased across every region measured. SEON attributes this to withdrawals flagged for unusual size or timing, including single high-value requests made from accounts with no prior withdrawal history. The average value of a flagged withdrawal more than doubled, from USD 202 to USD 436, indicating a shift by fraudsters from numerous small-value attempts towards fewer, higher-value exits.
Dormant accounts reactivated for coordinated withdrawals
The report identifies dormant accounts, previously verified but inactive, as a central indicator of fraud during the tournament. SEON recorded an 83% increase in daily identity mismatches linked to dormant accounts reactivating across its network, rising to 118% in Latin America. These accounts had completed verification well before the tournament began. When reactivated, often on unfamiliar devices, they were used to attempt high-value withdrawals. Credential-stuffing campaigns rose by 115% in Europe over the same period, a pattern SEON links to the exploitation of previously established account trust.
Latin America vs. Europe and North America
While registration blocks fell in most markets, Latin America recorded the opposite trend. Registration block rates in the region rose by 19%, and synthetic-identity blocks increased by 34% compared to baseline and by 64% in contrast to the 2025 control period. The company suggests this reflects existing detection rules responding to a surge in registration volume rather than a deliberate tightening of controls, with the region's false-positive rate also rising under the increased load.
Overall, the data points to a regional divergence: fraud pressure in Europe and North America shifted towards trusted accounts and cash-out, while Latin America experienced a registration-stage surge in synthetic identity activity.
Losses outpacing revenue growth
The findings are set against SEON's wider 2026 betting and gaming report, which found that 57% of operators report fraud losses growing faster than revenue. The survey also found that betting and gaming is the only sector studied where operators prioritise adding headcount over investment in AI and machine learning tools, at 47% compared with 34%, leaving manual teams to manage fraud that arrives in concentrated bursts during major events.
