Egyptian authorities have collaborated with antipiracy coalition the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) to shut down a notorious sports piracy network that illegally streamed live football matches to audiences around the world.

The action is the latest in a series of takedowns in the Middle East North Africa (MENA) region. In recent months, ACE has worked with local authorities to shutter unlawful streaming operations. Major takedowns include Laroza, formerly the largest piracy site in MENA taken down last month; Cima4U, which operated nearly 500 illegal domains and was shut down in January; and five other MENA-based piracy rings closed in 2023.

Operating since late 2020, Livehd7’s network of live streaming websites and at least 85 associated domains offered users access to matches from Europe’s top football leagues including England’s Premier League, Spain’s La Liga, Italy’s Serie A, Germany’s Bundesliga, France’s Ligue 1 and Portugal’s Primeira Liga, as well as the United States’ Major League Soccer (MLS) and domestic cup competitions in those countries. The content also included all UEFA club competitions and international qualifiers for the FIFA World Cup, UEFA Euro and EUEFA Nations League, and CONMEBOL Copa America.

“We applaud the excellent work of Egyptian law enforcement in protecting the intellectual property rights of ACE’s sports media company members,” said Motion Picture Association (MPA) Executive Vice President and Chief Content Protection Officer, Larissa Knapp. “The piracy of live sports is especially detrimental and poses an existential threat to sports leagues and their distribution partners, as a live sports broadcast loses substantial commercial value once a game ends. ACE remains committed to collaborating closely with the Egyptian Police to bring illegal operators to justice.”

Through its various domains, the Livehd7 network logged more than 17 million monthly visits — more than 257 million visits in the past year. Site traffic originated primarily from Egypt, KSA, France, Germany and the United States.

“Egyptian-operated pirate websites are popular across the Middle East and North Africa and Arabic-speaking markets generally, causing detrimental harm to our industry,” said Cameron Andrews, Legal Director of Anti-Piracy at beIN MEDIA GROUP. “According to our research, in the MENA region alone, they cost beIN over a $1 billion a year and threaten the viability of our business, which in turn has a direct effect on what broadcasters can pay for sports rights. We are very pleased to see action being taken and ACE continues to set a precedent in the fight against piracy.”

In addition to European and North American leagues, the illicitly streamed content included national leagues in MENA such as the Saudi Pro League.

The ring operators frequently built new domains to circumvent site blocking and other enforcement measures implemented in the countries where users accessed the illicit content.

All sites will be redirecting to the ACE ‘Watch Legally’ page.

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Categories: Articles, Broadcast, Business, Content, OTT, OTT, Pay TV, Piracy, Policy, Regulation, Rights

Tags: ACE, Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment, antipiracy, beIN MEDIA GROUP, Livehd7