June 5 – The battle against betting related match fixing is seeing a rapid uptake in stakeholders looking for ways to combine resource and intelligence to control what is probably the biggest threat to the sporting integrity of the game. The latest information sharing agreement is between the European Union’s law enforcement agency Europol, have linked up with Sportradar’s betting security division.
The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the two organisations “will actively engage in the exchange of expertise, statistical data, information and/or trends as they relate to sporting integrity.”
This is seen as a first step with the two parties will now begin exploring projects together either as a collaboration or to support each other.
Sportradar has a number of similar agreements with national law enforcement bodies and football federations, but this is the first with a regional agency.
Sportradar CEO Carsten Koerl pointed to the importance of the role Europol is playing highlighting Operation VETO that co-ordinated police teams from 13 European countries that identified 425 individuals suspected of fixing 380 matches across 15 countries.
“Their commitment to stamping this scourge out is self-evident. The fact that we have today signed this agreement to share information and collaborate on projects is a huge distinction for our Security Services and our Fraud Detection System,” said Koerl.
Europol Deputy Director, Wil van Gemert (pictured) said: “In order to try and stop match fixing stakeholders from many different areas need to work closely together. I look forward to our cooperation with Sportradar, and the aim is to make it more difficult for match fixers and manipulators to hide”.
Koerl talked about working together in the spirit of the Macolin Convention which is a European-lead convention but is open to an increasing number of countries with the objective of becoming a global understanding focussed on collaboration between stakeholders from sports, law enforcement and public agencies.
“We will start making further breakthroughs and will continue closing the net on those who would undermine the credibility of the sports we all love and follow,” said Koerl.
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