In Reply to: The mideast war is over!! Not that one. posted by mh on September 29, 2026 at 10:30:29
DraftKings Is Using AI to Identify Problem Gamblers and Get Them Hooked
The gambling hub DraftKings could be using the mountains of user data it collects, and the analyst expertise it boasts, to stop problem gamblers from ruining their lives.
Instead, it’s using this power to do the opposite, according to the New York Times: scout for potential addicts and keep them hooked.
To do that, DraftKings, which is best known for its sports betting app, built an AI model to determine which customers were likely to gamble and lose the most money in response to its enticing promotions, according to numerous former employees, some of whom helped build the machining learning algorithm. It predicts which gamblers could lose the most, scoring them based on a trove of their personal habits. A high score meant that a gambler was more likely to lose more money on each promotion DraftKings offered to keep them gambling.
Jayden Butts, a former data analyst at the company who tested the AI model, described the initiative to the NYT.
“We are looking for traits and features that we can target that indicate a good investment,” he told the newspaper. By strict financial logic, the “best investment would be a problem gambler.”