Top soccer leagues and broadcasters send letter to X demanding more action against illegal content

Some of Europe’s main broadcasters and top soccer leagues have sent a letter to the CEO of social media platform X, Linda Yaccarino, demanding more action against the distribution of illegal content.

The letter, which was obtained by The Associated Press, had 14 signatories, including the Premier League, Spanish league, Bundesliga, Italian league, DAZN, Sky, beIN, DirecTV and Movistar Plus+. Soccer governing bodies UEFA and CONMEBOL also signed the letter.

The signatories said they wanted “to draw X’s immediate attention to its persistent failings in the fight against the availability of unlawful content on its platform and urgently call for a meeting with X’s representatives to address this unacceptable situation.”

“X’s approach to taking down unlawful live content notified to them is woefully insufficient and inadequate,” the letter said. “This makes our respective intensive efforts to tackle this problem hugely inefficient. Critically, since you acquired the platform, we have witnessed a demoralizing reduction in technical support making it ever more difficult to engage with the platform in any kind of meaningful discussion on this topic.”

The platform formerly known as Twitter did not immediately respond to a request from the AP for comment. The letter was obtained from a person on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to speak publicly about the issue.

In the letter, the signatories complained that X recently decreased its content moderation resources by 20%, and claimed the platform “lacks many of the features which other responsible social media operators deploy to combat piracy.”

The letter added there is “an increased perception among pirates that they can do as they wish on X with impunity,” resulting in an increased number of illegal live streams of games and ”making the overall situation absolutely untenable.” They said “X is increasingly the home of unlawful social media piracy.”

“The signatories to this letter express their severe concern as to the current state of affairs and urge X to take all necessary measures to (i) become a responsible platform which respects intellectual property and (ii) comply in full of its obligations under Digital Services Act as soon as possible.”

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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer