Building innovative tools for the exchange of information and awareness raising against match-fixing on sport

Although match-fixing and betting-fraud are fast moving international crimes, deeply infiltrated in the sports universe, they still face an anachronic lack of coherent, systematic and articulated response from sports, governments or society at large. Heterogeneous legal frameworks, reluctancy or even rejection to adopt enforcement measures, difficulties in assessing what should be the right approach and lack of thoughtful and efficient cooperation, all favour the continuous and infamous success and profit for organized crime in recent years.Match-fixing, in fact manipulating the results of matches and contests around the world for the purpose of betting-fraud, is more prevalent today than ever, but in a direct relationship to the increasing prevalence of on-line internationally available gambling on it, and to the clear and virtually unchecked vulnerability of gambling to criminal control and fraud or the lack of adequate and timely mechanisms for information exchange.As identified by several authors, widespread match-fixing occurs in great measure due to the lack of information and awareness of the athletes and/or of adequate and efficient capacity building programs of sport organisations and/or the lack of proper interexchange of information among the key-actors to enable them to counter criminal infiltration.In this framework, BITEFIX project aims to develop and provide innovative and practical tools to enable committed stakeholders (law enforcement authorities, betting regulators and operators, government agencies and sport governing bodies, mainly) to work together against match-fixing and betting-fraud in sports throught the exchange of timely, secure and reliable information and raise awareness about the importance of safeguarding the integrity of sport and of its irreplaceable role in European society, with a special focus on grassroots sports.