The Autorité Nationale des Jeux (ANJ) directed French ISPs to cut access to polymarket.com at the DNS level, one of the strongest enforcement tools available under French gambling law. The regulator cited four main concerns: the platform operates without French authorization, it poses significant financial risk to retail users, it collects no identity verification (commonly called KYC, or Know Your Customer), and some of its prediction markets may have been compromised. Polymarket had not issued any public statement as of publication time.

The action did not come without warning. ANJ first blocked financial transactions to Polymarket from French bank accounts in November 2024, a move triggered largely by the activity of an anonymous French trader known as "Théo." That trader placed roughly $80 million across 11 separate crypto wallets betting on Donald Trump's victory in the 2024 US presidential election and collected a payout that various sources put between $49 million and $85 million (approximately $80 million is the figure most widely cited in crypto coverage). The concentrated position by a single French national prompted ANJ to open a formal review of whether the platform was operating illegally for French users. Polymarket subsequently restricted French accounts from financial activity, but the website itself stayed accessible. The result was predictable: despite the financial block, Polymarket recorded 578,751 visits and 205,057 unique visitors from France in June 2026 alone, according to ANJ data.

A separate criminal dimension emerged in May 2026, when a Paris cybercrime unit opened an investigation into allegedly hacked weather prediction markets on the platform. ANJ indicated that the data feeds used to settle those markets (called oracles, software that pulls real-world information onto a blockchain) may have been compromised. The regulator cited this investigation explicitly in its blocking order, alongside concerns about market integrity and user risk.

The timing aligns with a broader coordinated push across Europe. In June 2026, ANJ joined regulators from eight other countries, including Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Switzerland, in a joint initiative targeting unlicensed prediction market operators. ANJ's role as a co-signatory of that initiative, just weeks before the July ISP block, makes clear the action was the culmination of coordinated multilateral pressure rather than a unilateral move. Spain had already ordered ISPs to block both Polymarket and US-based rival Kalshi in May 2026. The Netherlands rejected Polymarket's appeal in July. Italy added Polymarket back to its unauthorized gambling list the same month. The pressure is structural, not incidental. MiCA, the European Union's crypto regulatory framework, completed its transitional period on July 1, 2026, meaning any crypto service provider serving EU users now requires full authorization to operate legally. The European Securities and Markets Authority has also warned that event contracts may qualify as binary options, which are banned for EU retail clients under MiFID II, adding a second regulatory vector beyond MiCA.

Polymarket runs on Polygon, a proof-of-stake blockchain, with positions denominated in pUSD, a token backed one-to-one by Circle-issued USDC. The platform reported $1.16 billion in volume on its Polygon infrastructure in June 2026, a 9.4 percent month-over-month increase, with roughly 242,000 active traders, a 9.4 percent decline from May. New market creation hit a record 7,990 markets in June, up 21 percent from May. Volume on its international exchange reached $10.8 billion for the month, a monthly record. A single FIFA World Cup winner market had attracted $4.25 billion in volume as of July 15.

For users outside the United States and Europe, the practical implications of the French block are limited but worth watching. The ISP-level block targets the polymarket.com web address, not the underlying smart contracts on Polygon. Anyone with a non-custodial wallet (software that lets users control their own crypto without going through a company) can still interact with the protocol directly. French users demonstrated this workaround clearly: traffic to the site continued throughout the period when only financial transactions were restricted. VPN tools, which route internet traffic through servers in other countries, provide a further bypass. In India, where Polymarket reportedly has a significant user base and faces no current enforcement action, the French approach is notable because Indian authorities already have ISP-blocking authority under the Information Technology Act. The no-KYC structure that ANJ cited as a key problem would also run into friction under India's anti-money laundering rules for crypto exchanges. Enforcement has not yet occurred in part because prediction markets sit in an ambiguous regulatory zone in India, spanning SEBI's oversight of derivatives, state gambling law, and a central crypto framework that remains under development. In Nigeria and South Africa, neither the securities regulators nor gambling authorities have taken specific action against prediction markets, and users in both countries retain full access. Polymarket currently hosts 47 active Africa prediction markets, including more than 100 AFCON markets and 17 South Africa-specific markets, reflecting meaningful platform engagement with regional content rather than peripheral presence.

For developers building prediction market infrastructure, the French enforcement exposes a known architectural weakness. Blocking the centralized website is straightforward for any regulator. Blocking the on-chain protocol is a different and harder problem. Fully decentralized prediction markets without a central web interface, such as Augur and Gnosis, would be harder to shut down via ISP orders, but remain exposed to oracle-level and wallet-level interventions. The Paris cybercrime investigation into allegedly hacked oracles suggests regulators are already looking past the frontend.

Polymarket's current European difficulties are not without precedent. The platform settled with the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission in 2022, paying $1.4 million over charges related to unregistered event-based contracts. It subsequently blocked US users, though it began re-entering the US market through the acquisition of CFTC-registered exchange QCEX in 2025 and 2026. European regulators now have a ready-made precedent: the platform has accepted enforcement boundaries before when regulatory pressure became significant enough. Media outlets, influencers, and affiliates operating in France should also note that promoting unauthorized gambling sites carries a potential fine of up to €100,000 under French law, a liability ANJ has signaled it intends to pursue.