As sports betting grows in popularity, governing bodies are working to ensure fans can place responsible wagers. That includes beefing up in-house technology, deploying security personnel and partnering with integrity firms to identify violations. They’ve also been able to use new revenue streams from sportsbook partnerships and advertising.

Official betting takes many forms, including money lines and spreads. A money line is a straight bet that pays out if the team wins by a certain number of points, while a spread has an underlying probability of winning or losing. The odds are expressed as a negative or positive decimal, and can be found on the right side of the sportsbook page.

Betting on your own team can be both risky and lucrative. If you’re a fan of the LA Lakers, for instance, it can be tempting to place a bet on them. But you should make sure you’re able to remove your bias from the bet and choose the most likely outcome.

In the NFL, it’s against the league’s code of conduct for anyone to gamble on its games, regardless of whether they’re in uniform or not. This includes players, coaches and staff, as well as non-uniform team and league employees. Those who are found to be placing bets on the NFL and are at a game or in a league facility face an indefinite suspension. The league also conducts a postseason screening for officials, looking at criminal charges and convictions involving gambling or sports wagering.