According to Google's industry head James Cashmore:

"This is not a decision that's been made quickly; it's been something that's been under discussion for months"

"Dennis Woodside (Google VP and MD for UK, Benelux & Ireland) and the team have been reviewing policies both from a legal and user need point of view at a local level," he said. "I definitely think that local markets will make more decisions in the future."

Google UK has updated their policy to read:

Advertising for the promotion of online gambling websites is not permitted to target locations outside Great Britain (England, Scotland, and Wales). Ads for online gambling will not be displayed in other countries.

Online gambling includes, but is not limited to, the following:

• sports books and sports betting
• lotteries
• bingo
• poker
• sites that provide tips, odds, and handicapping
• software facilitating online casinos and gambling
• gambling tutoring online
• gambling-related eBooks
• play for fun gambling or casino games of skill including sites where the primary purpose is play for fun gambling
• affiliate sites with the primary purpose of driving traffic to online gambling sites

Advertising online gambling in Great Britain (England, Scotland, and Wales)

Google AdWords allows online gambling advertisements to target Great Britain (England, Scotland, or Wales) as long as the advertiser is registered with the Gambling Commission and provides a valid operating license number. Advertisers based outside the UK and within the European Economic Area who wish to target online gambling ads to England, Scotland, or Wales must be licensed to advertise online gambling in their respective country.

If you meet the above requirements and want to get started, review our Great Britain gambling application process below.

Great Britain gambling application process

To apply to advertise online gambling with Google AdWords, you will need to:

Create a new Google AdWords account solely for your gambling campaigns (this applies to both new and existing advertisers). - Fill in the application form and legal declaration. Please be sure to submit your new AdWords Customer ID, located at the top of any of your account pages. To ensure the quick progress of your application, fill in all of the requested information. We will review your request as quickly as possible and let you know whether we were able to approve your application or not.

I think that Microsoft Search in the UK does not require a valid operating license number.

But as far as Google and Yahoo are concerned, they both do!

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