Betting on Children: Why the Underage Gambling Mass Tort Demands Our Attention
By Madeline Pendley, Rafferty Domnick Cunningham & Yaffa
For decades, we have seen industries built on exploitation. Tobacco hooked a generation while denying health risks. Opioid manufacturers fueled an epidemic with reckless marketing. Today, another industry has found a way to profit from vulnerability, this time targeting children. The rise of underage gambling is one of the most urgent and underappreciated mass torts of our time.
This isn’t an issue of “kids sneaking into casinos.” That image is outdated, and the problem is minimal compared to what we are facing today. Instead, the modern gambling industry lives in the palm of a child’s hand.
Online sportsbooks, casino apps, loot boxes in video games, and daily fantasy platforms have created an ecosystem where gambling is accessible 24/7. Regulators cannot keep up, parents cannot keep watch, and corporations are cashing in on the very demographic they claim to protect.
A Digital Casino Without Walls
An alarming aspect of this case is the ease with which children can gamble. Unlike the physical casino floor, there are no bouncers at the door of a smartphone app. Age “verification” measures are grossly inadequate and easily bypassed by anyone who is tech-savvy.
Meanwhile, the apps themselves are engineered to be addictive: algorithms track user behavior and tailor offers to maximize and prolong engagement; push notifications buzz with “can’t miss” bets; flashy graphics mimic video games that children and young adults already love; popular influencers are paid a fortune to stream themselves gambling and betting on sports events; and relentless advertising during sporting events, ads that children inevitably see. All of this is to ingratiate gambling into the cultural mainstream, desensitize the public to the harms of gambling, and entice teenagers and young adults to use the platforms.
We know better. And the law must catch up.
The Emerging Mass Tort
The underage gambling cases fit a familiar pattern: a powerful industry creating foreseeable harm, denying responsibility, and externalizing costs onto families and communities.
The claims are grounded in negligent design, deceptive trade practices, and failure to implement reasonable safeguards. Just as opioid litigation exposed marketing practices that flooded communities with addictive drugs, we anticipate discovery in gambling cases will reveal a calculated indifference to the inevitability of underage play.
The scale is already staggering. Studies suggest that hundreds of thousands of minors in the United States are engaging in online gambling every year. Many are experiencing the classic symptoms of addiction: chasing losses, hiding behavior, depression, stealing to fund accounts, all before they can legally drive a car. The damage of these platforms is profound and results in financial loss, fractured families, academic decline, and in too many cases, suicidal ideation.
Anticipating the Defenses
We fully anticipate the industry will fight back hard. We should expect the usual arsenal of defenses. Companies will argue that parents should monitor their children. But just as tobacco companies could not blame parents for kids’ smoking, gambling operators cannot shift the duty of care when they profit directly from foreseeable underage use.
Some platforms will try to hide behind broad immunity doctrines, claiming they merely provide “services.” But when the very architecture of the app encourages addictive play and fails to verify age, these companies are not neutral intermediaries, they are designers and profiteers.
We must be prepared to dismantle these defenses with expert testimony, industry documents, and a relentless focus on corporate conduct.
Lessons from Past Mass Torts
If history teaches us anything, it is that litigation can force change where legislation stalls. The tobacco settlements in the 1990s, the asbestos verdicts of the 1980s, and the opioids settlements of the 2020s all began with trial lawyers who refused to accept that powerful industries were untouchable.
The underage gambling mass tort has the same potential. Already, public sentiment is shifting. Parents are alarmed. Lawmakers are holding hearings. Editorial boards are sounding alarms. But systemic change will not happen until discovery drags corporate strategies into the light and juries have their say.
The litigation also presents an opportunity to modernize how we think about products. Gambling platforms are not simply services; they are products designed with behavioral hooks. They are no less defective when they target children than a toy coated with lead paint. Courts must be willing to treat them accordingly.
Why This Matters to the Trial Bar
Some may ask why plaintiff lawyers should prioritize this fight. The answer is simple: because no one else will. Regulators are years behind. Politicians are entangled with gambling lobbyists. Parents are outmatched by the sophistication of digital design.
We are the last line of defense. We have the tools to aggregate claims, the discovery mechanisms to expose misconduct, and the trial skills to translate abstract harms into human stories. Most importantly, we have the moral obligation to act when children are being systematically exploited.
This is not about eliminating gambling. This is about drawing a line that says children are not commodities, and addiction is not an acceptable business model.
The underage gambling mass tort is still in its early stages. Cases are being filed, theories are being tested, and defenses are being sketched. But the arc is clear: this will be one of the defining litigations of the next decade.
Mass torts are always about more than damages. They are about accountability, deterrence, and the possibility of systemic change. Underage gambling is no different. The industry has placed its bet on children’s vulnerability. It is our job to make sure that bet does not pay off.
About Madeline Pendley
Madeline Pendley is a national Mass Torts attorney with Rafferty Domnick Cunningham & Yaffa, representing individuals harmed by dangerous drugs, toxic exposures, and defective products. With leadership roles in landmark MDLs like Valsartan and Zantac, Madeline frequently writes and lectures on emerging torts and public-health risks nationwide.
