The Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 are about to start on Friday this week. Looking to ensure the games’ integrity and prevent match-fixing, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has announced that it has implemented multiple measures.

Olympic Integrity Unit Completes Risk Assessment

Risk assessment is an important factor in any sport or industry. Over the last few months, the Olympic Movement Unit on the Prevention of the Manipulation of Competitions (OM Unit PMC) completed a risk assessment of the 15 disciplines within the seven winter sports a part of the Olympic Games in Beijing.

Consequently, the unit shared its findings with the International Sports Federations (IFs). Throughout the games, the IOC will be in contact with all the IFs and if necessary will point out breaches of the rules.

The IOC’s efforts to safeguard the integrity of the Olympic Games include the appointment of eight athlete ambassadors. Those ambassadors are current and former athletes and represent different countries and sports.

IOC Brings Athlete Ambassadors to Fight Match-Fixing

IOC’s Ethics Commission member and Olympic medalist in shooting, Ambassador Danka Bartenkova, said that protecting the integrity of the sport is critical. She outlined that match-fixing results in ruining “the passion of sport that all athletes have.” In conclusion, Bartenkova said that the athletes want fair play which can be achieved by educating all of them on how to protect themselves and the sport from match-fixing.

“It is critical to protect the integrity of sport.”

Danka Bartekova, Ambassador and member of the IOC Ethics Commission

Besides athlete ambassadors, the IOC has created a special campaign that aims to fight against match-fixing. The campaign dubbed Make The Right Decision features educational materials translated into more than 20 different languages. Moreover, the campaign features other educational tools, as well as an e-learning course.

Under the current Code of Conduct, all athletes, coaches, and other officials that are a part of the games in Beijing must not participate in any form of betting on any Olympic events. Additionally, those people must not share inside information or try to manipulate any of the competitions. They are also obliged to report any such breaches to the IOC integrity hotline.

Multiple Organization Will Monitor Sports Betting Activities

Another method that will be used to help prevent competition manipulation is the monitoring of sports betting. This is in fact not a new tool to help identify potential match-fixing. All Olympic Games since 2008 have been monitored and Beijing won’t be an exception. OM Unit PMC and its partners will monitor the Olympic competitions via its IBIS platform.

Such partners include the International Betting Integrity Association (IBIA), the sports integrity solutions leader Sportradar, the Global Lottery Monitoring System (GLMS), as well as the Council of Europe’s network of national platforms (Group of Copenhagen). Major sports betting companies and regulators have also vowed to join the monitoring.