IOC Sends Thousands of DMCA Notices to Block Pirate Live Streams of the Olympics

• The International Olympic Committee sent thousands of DMCA takedown notices to Google.
• This relentless flagging aims to protect broadcasting rights regarding the huge sports event.
• The action focuses on pirate streams of the Olympics as opposed to torrent websites.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is focusing on flagging pirate websites that offer the 2024 Olympic Games live stream. During the past week, the IOC sent thousands of DMCA takedown notices to Google in an effort to make it harder for the public to find pirated Olympics streams.

Public data from the Google Transparency Report and the Lumen Database reveal that the IOC sent a large number of takedown notices, asking Google to remove 5,907 URLs from its search engine.

The list does not include torrent sites but mainly mentions pirate streaming sites such as Antenasports.ru, Buff-streams.net, Francemag.com, and Watchsportnow.com.

The copyright claim mentions the IOC owns all rights in and to the Olympic Games and the Olympic Properties, including the audio-visual content produced for the Olympic Summer Games Paris 2024.

Anti-piracy partner Friend MTS helped the IOC by issuing more traditional DMCA takedown requests. This entity also works with UEFA and British ITV broadcaster, among others. Friend MTS uses advanced forensic watermarking and fingerprint-based automatic content recognition.

Last week, some 30 pirate IPTV services offering illegal streams of The Olympic Games were blocked across France via a Paris Judicial Court order valid throughout the sports event’s duration, with the possibility of adding any new pirate domains that spawn afterward.

Some past requests haven’t been so fruitful. Sixteen years ago, the IOC requested the Swedish Government to assist with removing pirated broadcasts from The Pirate Bay. This proved unsuccessful, and the pirate platform temporarily renamed itself The Beijing Bay.