Norway’s gambling regulator has formally warned Norsk Tipping that it may impose a penalty of up to NOK 25 million after a system failure in the April 19, 2025 super draw led to 52 players being incorrectly selected as winners of million-krone prizes. The Norwegian Lottery Authority says the incident undermined confidence in the integrity of the draw and is now weighing sanctions while giving the operator three weeks to respond to the notice.

What Went Wrong in April’s Super Draw

According to the regulator, a technical issue at Norsk Tipping deleted entries from players who placed bets via cooperative banks around Christmas and New Year. Those players were then excluded from the Easter-time super draw, affecting 16,698 participants—equivalent to 0.2% of ranks—so the drawing pool was incomplete and 52 winners were selected incorrectly. Norsk Tipping later refunded stakes to the excluded customers, but the authority maintains that the drawing itself failed to comply with Norway’s Gambling Act because it was not conducted on the correct basis.

The regulator emphasized the stakes for public trust in a press release. As department director Tore Bell put it: “Trust that the draw and the basis for the draw will be correct is absolutely fundamental for a lottery. Therefore, it is very serious when this has not been in place.” He added that the authority had considered halting the April 19 drawing amid suspicions of errors, but proceeded after receiving assurances from the operator: “We can stop a lottery that is not being carried out correctly. We considered that in this case, but we received repeated guarantees that the draw would proceed correctly. It is unacceptable that there were still errors in the draw.”

Days after the draw, Norsk Tipping submitted a preliminary security report stating that the super draw was conducted with the proper drawing basis and probabilities. That conclusion later proved wrong. Bell criticized the verification failures: “It is reprehensible that Norsk Tipping was able to establish that the super draw was correctly carried out despite not checking that everyone who had bought tickets was allowed to participate in the draw. This is likely to weaken trust in the company.”

Escalating Enforcement and Prior Penalties

The proposed NOK 25 million penalty would be the fourth fine tied to draw or compliance issues in roughly a year. The authority lists three prior sanctions: NOK 2.5 million related to an incorrect NOK 25 million payment; NOK 36 million for failing to ensure that players could self-exclude; and NOK 46 million for drawing incorrect winners in national additional prizes for Eurojackpot and Lotto over several years. In addition, the regulator has notified Norsk Tipping it is considering a further fine of up to NOK 10 million over a June 27, 2025 Eurojackpot error in which approximately 47,000 players were told prize amounts that were far higher than the actual figures.

In a separate summary of the case, the authority described the April incident as “gross negligence,” noting that Norsk Tipping did not verify the full set of ranks despite knowing there had been serious issues in the drawing basis for an extended period: “This is gross negligence. Norsk Tipping did not check that all ranks were included in the draw, even though they had knowledge at the time that there had been serious errors in the draw basis over a long period of time.”

Norsk Tipping has been given three weeks from the notice to submit its response before the authority decides whether—and at what level—to finalize the NOK 25 million penalty. Beyond this case, the regulator has announced a broader review of the operator’s lottery processes: “All these cases make it crucial that Norsk Tipping tightens its routines, controls and the quality of what it does. That is why we have announced a major inspection this autumn where we will look at Lotto, Eurojackpot and Vikinglotto,” Bell said.

While refunds have been issued to players excluded from the April draw, the authority’s position is that remediation after the fact does not cure a flawed drawing process. The pending decision now focuses on sanctions and on ensuring robust controls so future drawings are conducted on a fully accurate, verified basis.