Brussels, 30 October: International sports betting integrity body ESSA reported 72 cases of suspicious betting to the relevant authorities during the third quarter (Q3) of 2017. This was made up of 46 cases in tennis, followed by football and table tennis with 8 cases each, basketball with four and two cases each for badminton, snooker and volleyball. A total of 152 cases of suspicious betting have been identified and reported by ESSA and its members during the first three quarters of 2017.
ESSA Secretary General Khalid Ali said: “The figures for this quarter again demonstrate the ongoing threat that faces the regulated betting sector and our sports and regulatory authority partners. ESSA has redoubled its efforts to meet that challenge and invested in a number of key initiatives and activities. Partnership working remains at the heart of that approach, with our recent betting integrity event and general stakeholder engagement programme a testament to that.”
The Q3 integrity report includes articles by international law enforcement body INTERPOL on the organisation’s actions to tackle organised criminal activity related to betting and match-fixing, and also by Matt Fowler, ESSA’s Betting Integrity Officer, who outlines his role and the positive impact of having a dedicated resource in this area for ESSA members and our partners alike.
ESSA holds positions on match-fixing and betting policy forums at the European Commission, Council of Europe and the IOC. It is driving a number of important initiatives aimed at addressing match-fixing and is currently involved in four anti-match-fixing projects (see here), having recently hosted an international betting integrity conference at Lords Cricket Ground in London attended by over 150 senior officials from sports bodies, regulatory authorities, policymakers and other key stakeholders.
A copy of ESSA’s Q3 2017 integrity report can be accessed here (also attached), along with previous reports.
About ESSA:
ESSA represents many of the world’s biggest regulated sports betting operators, serving over 40 million consumers in the EU alone. Concerned regulated bookmakers created ESSA in 2005 to monitor betting markets and alert sporting bodies and national regulators to suspicious betting patterns. The goal was, and is, to protect consumers from potential fraud caused by manipulating sporting events. ESSA helps to combat this with evidence-based intelligence it provides to sporting bodies and regulators.
Every year, our members invest over €50m in compliance and internal security systems in order to help combat fraud. They also give back to sport and society by spending €400m on sponsorship around the world – €250m of that in Europe alone. This increases substantially when advertising and photo and video-streaming rights are taken into consideration. ESSA and its members also co-fund an education programme on gambling with EU Athletes that reaches out to 15,000 athletes/players across at least ten different sports in 13 EU countries.
ESSA continues to play a key role as the regulated betting sector’s representative body at national and international match-fixing policy forums and holds positions on working groups at the European Commission, Council of Europe and the International Olympic Committee (IOC). The organisation is continually reassessing and improving its alert and reporting systems and has established information sharing arrangements with a range of sports bodies and regulatory authorities.
ESSA members include: 888sport, ABB, Bet-at-Home, Betclic, Betdaq, Betsson, BetStars, BetVictor, Betway, bet365, bwin, Expekt, Fonbet, Gamesys, Interwetten, Ladbrokes Coral, Paddy Power Betfair, Sky Bet, Sportingbet, Sporting Index, Sportium, Stanleybet, Stoiximan, Unibet and William Hill.
For more information see ESSA’s website at http://www.eu-ssa.org/ or visit us on twitter: @ESSA_Betting
