The Ukrainian open-source intelligence initiative DeepState, which created and maintains an interactive map of Russia’s invasion, has slammed the team behind a separate mapping tool, Polyglobe, accusing them of improperly using DeepState data to fuel bets on the war. The online prediction platform Polymarket allows users to gamble on a wide array of events — including celebrity breakups and even the Pope’s death. It has hosted tens of millions of dollars in wagers on the course of the Russian–Ukrainian war.

Polyglobe is a visualization tool for users of the Polymarket website, where people can place bets on a wide range of events, from sports and pop culture to politics and war. The tool displays a “globe” dotted with markers representing Polymarket bets, along with related news items and tweets. Its purpose is to help Polymarket traders assess information relevant to their wagers. Polyglobe is the brainchild of the Pentagon Pizza Watch project, which runs the so-called Pentagon Pizza Index.

On November 25, Pentagon Pizza Watch (PPW) tweeted about a “massive upgrade” to Polyglobe, announcing integration with DeepState’s map:

DeepStateLive’s Ukraine war map is now draped directly onto the globe, live and synced with Polymarket. […] Now, when you hover a market, we draw the exact area of operation it resolves on and spell out the rule in plain English. No more rule debates, no more guessing what actually settles.

In the replies, some users welcomed the new tool, while others criticized PPW for participating in betting on the war. In response, the project clarified that it “does not endorse war, violence, or suffering of any kind.” “This update was not created to gamify conflict, celebrate destruction, or trivialize human life,” PPW said.

The backlash continued after DeepState itself weighed in. The project declared that it had not authorized “some bookmaker service” that “profits from wagers on the war” to use its map. DeepState suggested that PPW must have connected either to the map through a free API intended for military or humanitarian users, or by scraping the data.

Following this statement, PPW apologized and removed the DeepState map from Polyglobe.

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How does Polymarket work?

The Polymarket site was created in 2020 by American Shayne Coplan, then only 24 years old. Coplan studied computer science at New York University but dropped out to devote himself entirely to cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology (in 2014, he became the youngest participant in Ethereum’s initial coin offering; at the time, the cryptocurrency — now worth more than three thousand dollars — could be bought for just 30 cents).

While home under pandemic lockdown, Coplan studied the work of economists who examine prediction markets, which ultimately inspired Polymarket. The platform runs on blockchain; users wager money on the outcome of real events and earn a profit if their predictions are correct. The odds for each event are derived from traders’ expectations as they place their bets.

Prediction platforms similar to Polymarket existed before, but Coplan’s startup surged ahead thanks to its user-friendly design and low barrier to entry. The boom in online gambling during the pandemic, the easing of regulatory restrictions, and the 2024 U.S. presidential election also played a role. Election-related wagers were crucial to moving Polymarket from the margins into the mainstream.

For several years, Polymarket could not operate legally in the United States, but when Donald Trump returned to the White House (and one of his sons became a Polymarket adviser), the platform found a way to relaunch for American users. In October, the company that owns the New York Stock Exchange began investing in Polymarket, and its valuation has since climbed to $8 billion. Coplan has been called the world’s youngest self-made billionaire.

The thing about Polymarket

Coplan describes Polymarket as a “reality check.” It is indeed a more objective barometer of public opinion than polling, according to Forbes senior contributor Jason Wingard, who argues: “Polls measure what people say. Bets measure what people believe. […] People are simply more honest when honesty costs money.” Although independent studies on the accuracy of prediction markets remain limited, Wingard urged senior executives not to disregard the data these platforms produce. The military has also begun paying attention.

But there’s a catch. First, Polymarket still operates in a regulatory gray zone: some countries treat it as a fintech startup, while others view it as an illegal gambling site. Second, Polymarket bets are vulnerable to insider trading and manipulation. Third, the platform allows wagers on events tied to human suffering and death. Users have placed bets on the Pope’s death, California wildfires, the war in Gaza, and the likelihood that Russia will use nuclear weapons.

By mid-November 2025, Polymarket hosted nearly 100 active wagers on the Russian-Ukrainian war, with almost $100 million at stake. The most popular question concerned whether Moscow and Kyiv would reach a ceasefire by the end of 2025 — a market that drew $44 million in bets and currently places the likelihood of a truce at 8 percent. Other wagers focus on the pace at which certain Ukrainian cities might fall and on the possibility of Russia invading NATO countries. Serhiy Sternenko, a civic activist and former leader of the Odesa branch of the Ukrainian nationalist group Right Sector, remarked that the war has been a tragedy for Ukrainians but, for some foreigners, it’s little more than a gambling opportunity.

Moral qualms, however evident, have not slowed the bettors. A few weeks ago, a Polymarket user publicly accused the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) of fraud, claiming that ISW falsified its maps (which were used to settle wagers on Ukraine’s territorial losses), causing some bettors to lose money. 0xinternetchild was promptly ratioed, especially by quote tweet that read: “Guy who is gambling on real people dying in a war but thinks being tricked is unethical.”

Further reading

• ‘Total nonsense’: A former Russian military cartographer on how the army cooks its maps to exaggerate gains