Governing bodies join the line up for FITS Forum in Geneva
August 21 – The Financial Integrity and Transparency in Sport (FITS) Forum being held in Geneva on 3-4 September has announced more speakers to its already heavyweight line-up.
News
Dow Jones to expand Risk & Compliance business into sport
By David Owen
June 15 – The news and business information group Dow Jones is moving to exploit the drive for better corporate governance in the sports sector by launching Dow Jones Sports Intelligence, a new offshoot of its existing due diligence business, Dow Jones Risk & Compliance.
ICSS to hold special session on financial integrity and transparency
June 8 – With the international spotlight focused on corruption and money-laundering at FIFA and doping claims in athletics, the Qatar-based International Centre for Sport Security (ICSS) is laying on a specialist session in Geneva in September to explore how sport, governments and the wider stakeholder community can tackle the issues and come up with ideas for robust reform.
Europol links with Sportradar to take the war to match-fixers
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.
MATCH exec Whelan is back in the game, bruised but not battered
By Andrew Warshaw
May 8 – Ray Whelan, the British director who was arrested and detained in Brazil after being wrongly accused of selling VIP World Cup tickets at inflated prices, is back working as a consultant for Match Services, FIFA’s official marketing partner, and is planning to write a book about the entire experience.
Beware the cyber warriors, they are coming to ruin you
By Andrew Warshaw
May 6 – One of the world’s leading sports security experts has warned that cyber attacks are the biggest growing threat to major football tournaments as well as other key sporting events.
STATS swoops to add Prozone to its growing global power play
By Paul Nicholson
May 6 – US sports data specialists STATS LLC has continued on the acquisition trail with the addition of UK-based Prozone, specialists in game and player performance tracking. Last September STATS acquired Bloomberg Sports. The enhanced capabilities of the group will lead to new product, and potentially real time stats for football clubs, ‘moneyball’ style.
Aussie police open gateway to more match-fixing data with Sportradar hook-up
May 4 – The Australian Federal Police (AFP) and Sportradar have the signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that is intended to beef up the co-operation and information sharing in the war on match-fixing.
Bodies call for co-operation and tougher laws in battle against match-fixing
April 17 – As the scourge of global match-fixing shows little sign of diminishing, fresh calls have been made for governments to introduce legislation that recognises it as a global crime.
Elite sport doping ‘likely’ to be between 14 -39%, finds new Dutch report
By David Owen
March 3 – New Dutch analysis has estimated that the prevalence of doping in elite sport is “likely” to be between 14 and 39% – far above the level of adverse analytical findings turned up by anti-doping tests. But the analysis also concludes that, while the tools to obtain a far more accurate gauge of true doping levels exist, published studies on the subject are “scarce”.
New report dispels betting pattern myths in the murky world of match-fixing
January 23 – A report titled The Odds of Match Fixing – Facts & figures on the integrity risks of certain sports bets by Professor Dr Ben Van Rompuy of the ASSER International Sports Law Centre draws a number of conclusions that blow away some of the myths around conventionally held thinking on match-fixing.
Sports journalists condemn attack on Charlie Hebdo and press freedom
January 9 – The International Sports Press Association, AIPS, has issued a damning statement condemning the terrorist attack on French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo that killed 12 people including 10 journalists.
Anti-doping body gets much-needed budget increase
By David Owen
November 16 – The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) is to receive a much-needed 3% budget increase in 2015. The Montreal-based organisation, which is funded broadly 50% by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and 50% by Governments, has had to make do with little extra money in recent times while public authorities in much of the industrialised world have been struggling to cope with the consequences of high debt and sluggish economic growth.
Fiscal 2015 starts off on the right foot for Nike
By David Owen
September 26 – Buoyant footwear sales, including football boots, helped Nike to a highly satisfactory 23% advance in net income for the three-month period including the 2014 FIFA World Cup.
Boost for WADA as China commits $1 million to new research fund
By David Owen
September 5 – China has provided a significant boost to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), becoming the first country formally to announce its contribution to a fund for new anti-doping research.