FACT Announces New Anti-Piracy Deal with BT Sport

FACT, the Federation Against Copyright Theft, has announced a brand new partnership with BT Sport, the broadcasting company hoping to take the UK sports world by storm.

In a bid to wrestle viewers away from UK satellite broadcaster Sky, BT announced that it would launch six brand new sport channels on August 1. An aggressive move saw the company offer the channels for free to its broadband customers.

“UK Sports fans have had a rough deal for too long. Many have been priced out of the market but we will change this by giving away BT Sport for free with our broadband. Sports fans are the winners today,” said BT chief executive Ian Livingston.

Along with this considerable investment comes the all-too-expected anti-piracy deal in order to ensure that non-BT customers (but not those paying for the service through rival Virgin Media) are unable to obtain BT Sport content for free.

Today, the Federation Against Copyright Theft announced that BT Sport has joined its ranks as the anti-piracy group’s latest member.

“I am very pleased that BT Sport has joined FACT and I look forward to a productive working partnership,” said Kieron Sharp, FACT Director General.

“FACT’s skills in intelligence gathering and effective enforcement actions have delivered excellent results for existing members and are helping to protect the jobs of hundreds of thousands of people working in the UK’s creative industries.”

Bruce Cuthbert, Director Commercial Customers, BT Sport said that FACT experience in content protection will be an asset to the company.

“We also look forward to working with FACT on future innovations to help to protect the investment BT Sport has made; this is something which is extremely important to us, as well as our customers,” Cuthbert added.