Over 600 computer resources seized, heavy fines to those responsible and to the spectators: this is the operation Euro strike 2020 of the Guardia di Finanza.
For a few years now, Italian law enforcement agencies have produced great efforts to combat piracy on the Internet, especially against the unauthorized and therefore illegal transmission of soccer matches. But not only that, because recently those who used Telegram to inform themselves illegally have also been punished. So the Guardia di Finanza has carried out yet another operation to counter the pezzotto, Euro strike 2020.
The name of the operation takes its cue from the European event currently taking place since the activity originated from UEFA which, as owner of the rights to broadcast the event, reported the proliferation of portals dedicated to illegal streaming of matches in the vicinity of the start of the European football event. Therefore, the preliminary activities concerned the identification and accurate monitoring of IPTV services and resources and illegal streaming starting from the opening ceremony of Euro 2020 that took place in Rome on June 11.
The Euro 2020 investigation against the pezzotto
The system laid bare by the men of the Special Unit for Privacy Protection and Technological Fraud of the Guardia di Finanza was quite articulated - as often happens in operations of this type - but this did not prevent it from going ahead.
The illegal architecture was based on state-of-the-art technological platforms, simultaneously fed by numerous sources of content located in Europe that transmitted audio-video content protected by copyright in data streams systematically redistributed all over the world. Curiously enough, the individual computer resources interrogated returned the message Xtream Codes Reborn on the browser, which leads back to the well-known worldwide pirate platform dismantled in 2019.
After the first investigative phase was completed, an innovative tracking system was used that allowed to identify all the recipients of the pirate streams. On the occasion of the schedule of June 17th, whose matches were, in Italy, exclusive to pay TV, the users of the illegal transmission had to deal with the sudden message on the screen warning them that the site through which they were illegally watching the Euro 2020 match had been seized and their connection data had also been detected.
The penalties for those responsible and the spectators
The people responsible for the pirate services now risk imprisonment from six months to three years and a fine of up to 15,493 euros. Sanctions also for those who forage for the illegal transmission: viewers intercepted by the men of the GdF will automatically receive an administrative fine of up to 1,032 euros.
The complex activity of investigation, coordinated by the Public Prosecutor of Naples, Giovanni Melillo and directed by the Deputy Public Prosecutor Vincenzo Piscitelli and by the Substitute Public Prosecutors Valeria Sico and Maria Sofia Cozza, has allowed the seizure and the obscuration of more than 600 computer resources among transmission servers, management platforms, showcase sites and live streaming sites, as well as the acquisition of the complete list of the identification data of hundreds of thousands of illicit users worldwide.
The Guardia di Finanza is committed to fighting this illicit business that finances organized crime and causes massive damage to the Italian economy to the detriment of the legal broadcasting industry, which, moreover, at a time already marked by the difficulties of the COVID 19 pandemic, is estimated to have lost over 8,000 jobs in 2020 alone (FAPAV data) precisely because of these criminal phenomena. Recently also Lega Serie A and Google have agreed to fight pezzotto and illegal streaming.