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John Leyden of the Register Newspaper reports that online bookie Bwin is funding a website that links to unauthorised live broadcasts of Premier League and other football matches.
A BBC Radio 4 investigated and found that myp2p.eu, which is based in The Netherlands, acts as a hub for online streams uploaded to the net by football fans around the world.
"While these fans are likely to be breaking copyright law for taking satellite feeds onto their computer and broadcasting them on the net, it's far less clear that the aggregator is doing anything wrong", Akash Sachdeva, a copyright expert at law firm Allen and Overy told Radio 4's You and Yours this past Friday.
The site, which has been running three years, last month won a court case brought by the Scandinavian branch of Canal+, lifting an injunction prohibiting it from offering links to streamed coverage of the major European football leagues (English Premiership, La Liga, Serie A etc). myp2p.eu was awarded costs according to online reports and myp2p.eu itself.
BBC researchers looked at the site during a match night, finding that odds for matches in play were displayed in ads running on the site. Surfers were invited to respond to these ads by placing a bet with Bwin.
In return, Bwin is paying a referral fee back to the website. Bwin is the official shirt sponsor of European football giants Real Madrid and AC Milan, so its involvement in a site of uncertain legality that is arguably taking money out of the game is questionable.
Bwin spokesman Kevin O'Neal told Radio 4 his company's deal with myp2p.eu is nothing more than an affiliate sponsorship, comparing the site to a phone book or TV listing, and sidestepped accusations it was funding a website that only existed because of piracy.
"There is no relationship between Bwin and any streamer of content," he said. "Viewers are not breaking any laws and I know for a fact Bwin is not breaking any laws."
Bwin is no stranger to controversy. Two of the Austrian betting firm's executives found themselves arrested in France in 2006.
Manfred Bodner and Norbert Teufelberger were preparing for a press conference announcing a sponsorship deal with AS Monaco Football Club when nearly a dozen French police stormed the media event and arrested the two men.
Bodner and Teufelberger "were detained for questioning by French authorities because of alleged violation of French gaming laws."
Christopher Costigan, Gambling911.com Publisher
