T
he International Betting Integrity Association (IBIA) reported Tuesday 65 cases of suspicious betting to the relevant authorities during the third quarter (Q3) of 2021. This period’s total represents a 14% decrease compared to Q3 2020, which saw 76 alerts.
The Q3 2021 alerts covered tennis (23 cases), football (18), table tennis (17), esports (2) and one each in handball, cricket, squash, basketball and futsal. From a geographical perspective, Europe accounted for nearly 60% of all alerts reported during Q3, followed by Asia with 15% and Africa 12%.
Other key data for Q3 2021:
- 28 – different countries where alerts were reported
- 23 – alerts reported in Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Russia (more than one third of the Q3 total)
- 9 – the number of different sports on which alerts were reported
- 6 – alerts on sporting events in the Americas
The International Betting Integrity Association is run by operators for operators, protecting its members from corruption through collective action. Its monitoring and alert platform is an anti-corruption tool that detects and reports suspicious activity on its members’ betting markets.
The association has longstanding information sharing partnerships with sports and gambling regulators to utilize its data and prosecute corruption. It represents the sector at high-level policy discussion forums such as the IOC, UN, Council of Europe and European Commission.
In an official press release, Khalid Ali, CEO of IBIA, spoke about these alerts and said: “The 65 cases in Q3 brings the nine-month total to 167 alerts, a 17% decrease on the same point in 2020 with 202 alerts. Tennis provided the highest number of alerts during the first three quarters with 47, followed by football with 46, table tennis 33 and esports with 25 cases. These four sports made up 90% of alerts reported in the first nine-months”.
“The benefits of being part of an international integrity monitoring body continue to be recognised; the association welcomes the decision of the Ontario authorities to require all licensed betting operators to be part of an integrity monitoring body, a position which is already in force in the recently opened market in the Netherlands. IBIA members are well-placed in those markets.”
