Dazn and the letter to web pirates: €500 to settle the dispute. 'And don't do it again'
The company writes to those who, according to the Lecce Public Prosecutor's Office, illegally watched sports content. Meanwhile, the improved global accounts are published
Key points
Dazn has decided to raise the level of the clash with web pirates even higher. And it has done so with a letter with a tone that is anything but friendly, sent to users identified in the context of an operation conducted by the Rome Finance Police and the Lecce Economic and Financial Police Unit, coordinated by the Apulian Public Prosecutor's Office.
The focus on users
It is the, promised, second level of the fight against piracy: to hit not only those who are upstream of the chain, and therefore those who profit from piracy, but also the end users from whom the streaming sports platform is now asking for a fee - reads the letter first intercepted by the Fanpage site and viewed by the Sole 24 Ore - as a "peaceful settlement of the damage suffered". All this, however, as mentioned, in a sort of pact of honour for those who have watched Serie A, Serie B and European Cups with pezzotto, as it results from the "criminal case no. 7719/22 R.G. N.R., hinged at the Prosecutor's Office of Lecce".
Behind the scenes, Dazn's legal machine is working on several fronts. In addition to Lecce, there are active investigations in Bologna, Cagliari and Naples. In all proceedings, the company is an injured party: user data, shared by the Guardia di Finanza only after clearance from the Public Prosecutor's Office, have made it possible to trace hundreds of thousands of illegal viewings.
Capitanio (Agcom): 'Real trouble for pezzotto users'
Giving institutional voice to the tough punch is Agcom commissioner Massimiliano Capitanio. "Now for the users of #pezzotto and #pirate applications there is real trouble," he wrote in a post. "After the €141 fine, now the rights holders are presenting the bill for not taking legal action. Dazn is asking for €500 in compensation to the 2200 fined (but there are another 4000 fines coming throughout Italy). Sky Italia and Lega Serie A and Lega Serie B are about to send similar notices."
Then the broadside: "These are unprecedented measures to crush the cancer of #piracy, which enriches mafias and organised crime, robs the country of more than EUR 2 billion every year, robs our young people of 12,000 jobs, encourages the theft of sensitive data and fuels online fraud, reinforcing the dangerous culture of those who believe that everything is allowed on the web".
