The Big Interview: Sportradar

Sportradar’s Managing Director Integrity and Strategy Andreas Krannich talks about the company’s Security Services and how they are the front line when it comes to preventing and detecting match-fixing across sports, across the world.

How serious a problem is match fixing in sport?

To set the scene, Sportradar estimate that the betting turnover per year is around €750 billion worldwide, and looking at just the FIFA World Cup this year, up to 500 markets were offered per game and around €14 million was placed during each minute played in Brazil this summer. Sports betting is big business and lucrative. As a result, so is match-fixing.

Back in early 2013, UEFA President Platini called match-fixing “the greatest threat to football”, while IOC President Bach has gone on record to say that he considers match-fixing to be a bigger scourge than doping. The reality is that match-fixing has evolved in recent years with the involvement of organised crime syndicates worldwide. As things stand, match-fixing presents criminals with an opportunity characterised by low cost, low risk, weak sanctions and poorly coordinated transnational defences. With high returns possible, many syndicates have cottoned on to the attractiveness of investing their resources and operations into manipulating sports results. Unfortunately, at the moment, not enough is being done to dissuade them and that puts sport globally in real danger.

How does the Fraud Detection System work? What are the processes behind it?

In a nutshell, our Fraud Detection System (FDS) is a match-fixing fire alarm. Our system has access to the real time movements across all sports markets offered by over 450 bookmakers worldwide. This data, which can reach up to 5 billion odds movements a day, pours into our system that applies incredibly advanced algorithms to that data in order to raise alerts whenever odds movements in the pre-match or live data are suspicious. The next stage of the process sees our 40 or so Expert Analysts check those alerts in order to ascertain what legitimate reasons could explain the alerts. If the alerts cannot be legitimised, then our Expert Analysts, drawn from a range of sporting and betting backgrounds, put together a FDS Report for each match that concerns our clients that is still considered suspicious.

Which sports, leagues, competitions do you work for? What challenges come with that?

We have adapted our FDS to make sure that it is accurate and credible across a range of sports including football, basketball, cricket, rugby, futsal and handball to name a few. Our earliest clients were in football, and our close relationship with UEFA was pivotal in crafting an FDS that meets the highest standards of accuracy and quality. Under that relationship, we monitor the top two divisions and the premium Cup competition in each of the 54 Member Associations. Apart from UEFA, we work with CONCACAF, the AFC as well as leagues such as the MLS, the Thai Premier League and the Indonesian Super League. Beyond football, we work with some of the biggest rights holders in rugby (the RFU and ARU) and cricket (the ICC and ECB). As at today, we are in an enviable and trusted position across sports and leagues, but we continue to develop our FDS and are always on hand to support those committed to safeguarding their competitions. Our team of developers can turn our FDS on for existing sports overnight and develop the system for a new sport in a matter of weeks!

What is it about your System that inspires the confidence of some of the key rights holders in sport?

This is a really good question. We have found that the integrity ‘industry’ (if you can call it that) tends to attract organisations and individuals with dubious credentials and motives. It is somewhat ironic! That being the case, we work doubly-hard to make sure that our partners and potential partners are left in no doubt as to why we are the most trusted integrity partner available. Our ISO Certification provides a reputable endorsement of the unparalleled level of data feeding in to our system, the layers of computer and human-based oversight and the quality and thoroughness of our FDS Reports. Our list of partners, all willing to provide us with positive testimonials, are a powerful indicator to the sports sector that we are the organisation to work with when compromise is not an option. Finally, we have built up a track record of successfully initiating and supporting sporting and criminal investigations worldwide. The Southern Stars case, which has returned six guilty verdicts, shows that even beyond sport’s direct jurisdiction, we remain a powerful and trusted tool and ally.

Which parts of the world are you focused on?

Our Security Service came into existence off the back of the Hoyzer scandal in Germany midway through the last decade, so our first years were focused on Europe, where we established strong relationships with UEFA and other key stakeholders, such as the DFL and the DFB in Germany. In recent years, our horizon has broadened and we are delighted that some key countries in Asia have decided to bring us on board. Asia today has a growing position in sport, which is cause for excitement, but also caution. Vulnerabilities can always be exploited and so we are activating resources in Asia, by opening offices in Hong Kong and soon in Sydney, to make sure that we are on hand to support the region’s anti-match fixing efforts. A great deal of our focus in the next few years will remain in Asia. Having said that, we are also monitoring development in North America closely. We know that match-fixing takes place there and we also know that the sands around the issue of sports betting and shifting there. With an office in Minneapolis, Sportradar are well-placed to mobilise its expertise and team there as and when the next stages of the development take place.

How do you work with non-sporting organisations such as law enforcement agencies or government level stakeholders?

Our work with these organisations is a real point of pride for us. In terms of law enforcement agency work, apart from our work with the Victoria Police during the Southern Stars case, we have also supported investigations in countries such as Hong Kong and the recent case in Austria which saw eight fixers found guilty. These ‘wins’ have helped build our credibility in the eyes of those discussing and dictating policy at government level, even at EU level. I have had the privilege of taking part in panels in Italy and Germany, where our expertise  is helping to shape official stances of national and multinational institutions. There is an appetite and a need to develop a monitoring and information hub that these institutions can call on when coordinating and clarifying intelligence and responses and Sportradar are very close to launching this in the coming months, marking a real milestone in how the world takes on match-fixers.

Finally, is your work really making a dent in match-fixing globally?

We know that our FDS has a powerful deterrent effect on fixers and we know that our FPS have proved invaluable and informative to players, referees and officials. Just by way of example, the number of suspicious matches that followed our FPS Tour in Malta showed a marked decrease when compared to the period before the Tour. It is difficult to quantify the impact we are having effectively and we would love to hear from fixers to let us know that our name strikes fear into their hearts! Having said that, match-fixing tactics and schemes are constantly evolving: the recent ghost games are proof of that. The saying goes that necessity is the mother of invention and I think in this case, the necessity to find countries or tactics that are more difficult to track and monitor is born of the pressure that organisations such as Sportradar are putting on fixers, whenever they sign a new partner or launch a new Integrity Tour.