Advertising for an unlicensed iGaming platform found in the UK featuring footballer Jude Bellingham and a fake BBC publication

The ads were distributed via Instagram. Users were shown a fake app download page and a post purportedly from the BBC claiming that Real Madrid midfielder Jude Bellingham had launched his own betting app, Bellingham Bet.

After Simon Clare, PR director at international gambling holding company Entain, drew attention to the campaign, the ads were removed.

Fake celebrity endorsements built around AI-generated news articles are becoming a recurring pattern in unlicensed iGaming marketing, and football remains a favorite vehicle precisely because the audience overlap with sports betting is so direct.

NEXT.io found that the website the ads led to shared technical similarities with the infrastructure of a major international gambling operator that sponsors one of the English Premier League clubs, according to the published investigation details.

The outlet separately emphasized that the identified similarities do not confirm the operator’s involvement in the advertising campaign. According to the investigators, they could be explained by the use of shared providers or third-party services.

What makes this case notable is not the tactic itself but the platform involved. Instagram advertising review is supposed to catch impersonation and unlicensed gambling promotion, yet a campaign using a Premier League-level footballer’s image ran long enough to be flagged externally rather than caught internally.