CSGO skin gambling under pressure as Valve tightens Steam rules

pcgamesn.com:

CSGO skin gambling could face increased pressure and scrutiny following revised Steam guidelines issued by Valve. The FPS game allows for a variety of trading types and CSGO skin exchanges, but in some cases these may violate the new version of Steam’s conduct rules, potentially leading to account sanctions. The announcement from Valve comes as CSGO cases see record opening numbers, and we await the arrival of Counter-Strike 2.

Over the years, CSGO skin gambling has taken various forms. In some instances, players can use the skins they have obtained in Counter-Strike Global Offensive in essentially the same way as one might use cash or chips at a casino, placing bets using the skin as currency. There is also ‘public pot’ or simply ‘pot’ betting, whereby players enter their skins into a common pool, and an automated system selects one winner, who receives every skin that has been entered.

The issue, for Valve, at least, arises from various gambling websites requesting or demanding access to customers’ unique Steam information. Some CSGO skin gambling services only permit and process transactions using the Steam application programming interface (API) itself – essentially, players need to provide their unique Steam account data, and the gambling transaction is processed, at some level, using information that is proprietary to the Steam platform.

Valve has previously launched legal action against CSGO gambling sites that demand access to the Steam API, particularly in 2016 when it pursued outlets such as CSGOLounge and CSGOLotto. CSGO skins however accrue some of their value owing to the availability of gambling services – in theory, the more outlets available for players to gamble their skins, the more that CSGO skins will