Football stadium – Photo by Tembela Bohle on Pexels
(BRUSSELS) – The European Commission adopted a Recommendation Thursday on how to combat commercial scale online piracy of sports and other live events, such as concerts and theatre performances.
The Recommendation encourages EU Member States, national authorities, holders of rights and providers of intermediary services to take effective, balanced and appropriate measures to fight unauthorised retransmissions of such streamings, in full compliance with fundamental rights and personal data protection rules.
“…commercial scale piracy is jeopardising the viability of our creative and sports industries,” said EC vice-president Margrethe Vestager: “Especially in case of live events which generate most of their value during the real-time transmission. It is therefore essential that online intermediaries cooperate with live and sports event organisers as well as broadcasters to combat piracy of live events.”
The Recommendation focuses on three main areas:
- Prompt treatment of notices related to live events: it stresses the importance of urgent action from providers of hosting services in order to minimise the harm caused by illegal streaming.
- Dynamic injunctions: the Recommendation encourages the use of blocking injunctions tailored to live events and, in the case of live sports events, encourages Member States to grant legal standing to sports event organisers to seek an injunction where it is currently not possible.
- Commercial offers and awareness: it recommends live and sports event organisers and broadcasters to increase the availability, affordability and attractiveness of their commercial offers to end users across the Union. It calls on Member States to raise users’ awareness on legal offers to enjoy this type of content among consumers and on the issue of piracy among enforcement authorities.
The Recommendation also enhances the cooperation amongst the relevant national authorities, and between rightholders and intermediaries to better tackle the phenomenon of unauthorised retransmissions of live events. An important objective is to ensure a regular exchange of information among administrative authorities on the measures applied, their challenges and the good practices against online piracy of live events. Cross-border cooperation between Member States is important in view of the nature of piracy, which takes place across borders.
Finally, the Recommendation sets up a solid monitoring system to assess its effects on the fight against piracy and to consider further measures if needed. This work will be done with the support of the European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights (EUIPO Observatory) and will entail the establishment of clear Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to conduct an effective monitoring.
Commission Recommendation on combating online piracy of sports and other live events
