Representatives from sports and sports betting monitoring organizations, law enforcement, regulators, policy makers, judicial authorities and athletes participated in the IntegriSport Next Awareness Raising Session, which began on 29 June in Tibilis, Georgia.
The two-day, hybrid event is part of the 2nd edition of the ERASMUS+ project and is organized by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Youth of Georgia, the CFCS Sport Integrity Group. The goal is to bring together diverse stakeholders to share good practices in the investigation and detection of cases of manipulation of national and international sports competitions.
“The more people we work with, the more we exchange intelligence and information, the better it will be for our industry and achieving the integrity of sports,” said Luca Esposito, GLMS Secretary General, while speaking at the Georgian IntegriSport Next Awareness Raising Session.
GLMS activities help maintain global sport integrity
Esposito highlighted the three pillars of GLMS activities that contribute greatly to the global effort to maintain sport integrity and combat match fixing.
Education and prevention programs: working with stakeholders on capacity-building activities, awareness raising of GLMS activities at events, organizing workshops and training sessions and education projects for sport, together with law enforcement (Integriball, Integrisport). Working with intergovernmental and sports organizations on policy making.
Monitoring, detecting, analysing: sports competitions and exchanging information with members, which can be used as evidence in legal proceedings around match fixing.
Examining betting patterns, alerting members and if required, creating reports with key betting and event information such as: bet description, wager value, time / prices, distribution channel, (retail / digital), geographical location, and money flow monitoring.
Stakeholder and policy making: engaging in the development of regulatory standards, guidebooks and exchange of information at key tournaments; collaborating with sport organisations, law enforcement agencies, regulators, sport leagues / federations integrity units and sport prosecutors.
Providing intel that proves sport manipulation
With hubs in three global regions, GLMS monitoring teams work around the clock and send alerts about suspicious activities concerning sports competitions to members, who in turn provide feedback on the competitions, which may warrant further investigation and result in the creation of a report.
Additionally, any GLMS members can request a report and specify the type of information they require.
“Our intelligence and reports can be used in legal proceedings as evidence, to prove that sports manipulations have occurred”, said Esposito.
An example of this occured in 2015, when the Dutch Football Association KNVB was informed of possible match manipulations by an Albanian club against which it had played some games. The Dutch FA contacted the GLMS Dutch lottery member, who in turn contacted GLMS to request the intel needed to prove the suspicians. In 2016, the information provided by GLMS, enabled the Court of Arbitration for Sport to uphold an UEFA ban of the Albanian club from the Champion’s League for one season.
