beIN SPORTS and DAZN team up to battle illegal streams

DAZN and beIN SPORTS are supporting a new worldwide task force with the mission to combat illegal streams of sports. Piracy of soccer streaming is a major issue for streaming services, such as beIN SPORTS and DAZN. A Parks Associates estimate put the cost of piracy at $113 billion for streaming services by 2027.

According to the Financial Times, this task force has the goal of identifying and targeting sports piracy operations. Then, it will use policing and related organizations like Interpol and Europol to enforce punishment.

Los Angeles anti-piracy coalition Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) is the spearhead for this movement. This group has experience in cracking down on sports piracy. Moreover, it has worked with beIN SPORTS in the past. During the 2022 World Cup, ACE and beIN SPORTS identified a piracy group in Morocco that was using beIN’s broadcasts of the World Cup. It successfully shut that operation down.

As streaming services continue to be the norm in sports viewership, more fans are looking to watch via strictly the internet. According to Synamedia, many people actually paid for illegal streams. In many cases, they were willing to pay to switch to the legitimate providers.

beIN SPORTS and DAZN suffer from illegal streams

Even though beIN SPORTS and DAZN have a limited catalog of soccer offerings for American audiences, they are major players in Europe and the rest of the world. For example, the illegal streams directly impact the providers’ coverage of domestic competitions and the UEFA Champions League.

Jan van Voorn, executive vice-president and head of Ace, says having a major provider like DAZN join the cause provides proof that this is a major issue.

“The addition of DAZN and the creation of the Ace sports piracy task force marks a turning point for Ace and confirms yet again that we are the essential partner to anyone who recognizes the threat of piracy to their business.”

PHOTO: IMAGO / NurPhoto