Former DraftKings employees say the company used AI and customer data to decide who should receive betting offers, including gamblers likely to spend more after receiving a promotion, according to a New York Times investigation.
The company used an internal measure called “elasticity” to estimate whether an offer would lead someone to place more bets.
“Is this person going to give us more than we’re giving them?” former DraftKings data analyst Jayden Butts told the Times. “And if the answer is yes, open the floodgates.”
Six former employees who worked on the system told the Times they later regretted it.
“It is as predatory as it sounds,” one former analyst said. “If you lose more, we give you more, so you keep playing more.”
DraftKings rejected the allegations. The company told the Times that its promotions are “directed toward customers who demonstrate sustained, engaged use of our platform, not toward customers based on their losses.”
One of the gamblers cited in the Times report, Bryan Biehl, said he lost nearly $70,000 betting online, more than half of it through DraftKings. He said the company’s offers made it harder to stop betting after he began treatment for gambling addiction in late 2024. Emails reviewed by the newspaper showed he received 40 DraftKings promotions during the first two weeks of December that year.
“I would get flooded with bonuses and deposits,” Biehl said. “If you are in addiction, you are not going to say no.”
Biehl said he gambled again on Christmas Day before signing up for self-exclusion programs that blocked him from betting apps. DraftKings declined to comment to the Times on his account.
The Times also reported that a separate DraftKings team developed a model to identify customers who might be at risk of gambling problems. The company later dropped the project. Lori Kalani, DraftKings’ chief responsible gaming officer, said the company decided against using it because “we evaluated that it wasn’t evidence-based.” She said its existing system was a “better methodology.”
The report also drew criticism on social media, where users accused betting companies of targeting people after losses while limiting those who win.