Here`s the link:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/bf0ea97a-e605-11e9-bc3e-661ff0438ed9
FA ramps up pressure over ‘spygate’ row between Liverpool and Manchester City
City asked for information on hack claims
Matt Dickinson, Chief Sports Writer |
Martyn Ziegler, Chief Sports Reporter
October 4 2019, 12:01am, The Times
Michael Edwards is Liverpool’s sporting director PETER BYRNE/PA
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The Football Association has asked Manchester City for information on the hacking dispute with Liverpool in a significant escalation of the controversy.
The involvement of the governing body, which wants to examine any evidence gathered by City to see if there is a case to pursue, will increase pressure on the Premier League to launch its own investigations into how Liverpool came to pay City £1 million after a complaint from the Manchester club that their scouting system had been hacked.
The league has so far declined to become involved, despite a rule stating that “each club shall behave towards each other club and the League with the utmost good faith”, but that could change after the FA’s written request to see evidence.
The FA’s move is not being termed an investigation but the fact the governing body has become involved is potentially significant. The FA’s rules include a clause on misconduct which states that: “A participant should at all times act in the best interests of the game and shall not act in any manner which is improper or brings the game into disrepute.” The rules also define a participant as including any “affiliated competition, club, club official” as well as players.
The confidential seven-figure settlement took place in September 2013 after City had employed computer-espionage experts to see if the system had been spied on. They were worried that all their information on transfer targets and scouting reports had been compromised.
As revealed by The Times, the settlement came a year after three former City scouts moved to Liverpool. Two of them were alleged by City to have been involved in accessing their database on the Scout7 system on hundreds of occasions. Michael Edwards, now Liverpool’s sporting director, was also named in the settlement.
The scandal would appear to be the worst case of alleged misbehaviour by one top-flight club to another in the Premier League’s history
The two scouts alleged to have been involved in accessing City’s Scout7 system were Dave Fallows, now Liverpool’s head of recruitment, and Julian Ward, who was Liverpool’s European scouting manager for Spain and Portugal and is now the loan pathways and football partnerships manager.
Among the allegations is that the login of Rob Newman, a Manchester City scout, may have been used illicitly by senior Liverpool staff over an eight-month period from June 2012 to February 2013.
The £1 million settlement was made without Liverpool or the accused individuals accepting any liability or wrongdoing. After the revelations, a Liverpool spokesperson said: “Liverpool FC does not provide any comment on any allegations relating to legal agreements it may or may not have entered into with any other club, organisation or individual.”
Ian Ayre was Liverpool’s managing director at the time and is understood to have been involved in handling the complaint by City. He left the club in 2017 and there is no suggestion that he had any knowledge of any attempts to access City’s scouting database.
Manchester City have declined to comment.
After suspicions were raised, City appointed a forensic computer expert able to carry out an investigation that tracked suspicious logins and IP addresses. Evidence requested by the FA is expected to include any reports produced by the expert, including pages of detail on how City’s Scout7 database was accessed, and from where.
A source close to the Premier League said they were unaware of the settlement at the time. The league, which on Wednesday appointed David Pemsel, the Guardian Media Group’s chief executive to succeed Richard Scudamore in the same role, may be unable to ignore the case if the FA hands over evidence showing a breach of rules.
It is understood that the Premier League has yet to receive a complaint. Its usual approach has been to not intervene if a dispute between two clubs has been resolved between them.
The revelation of the scandal comes with Liverpool and City fighting it out, once more, to be champions of England. Pep Guardiola’s team won the title by a single point last season but Liverpool are ahead by five points after seven games.
After
The Times broke the news of the scandal, Damian Collins, MP, the chairman of the digital, culture, media and sport committee, said the Premier League should look into the affair.
Collins, whose committee has covered issues of data breaches, said: “I do believe the Premier League should try to establish exactly what happened in this case and how the clubs came to a settlement.
“It is an important issue if confidential player data was being accessed. There could even be grounds for this being investigated by the Information Commissioner’s Office.”
Reports that Manchester City believed their scouting database may have been hacked first emerged in June 2013, and it was suggested that City had sped up the deals to sign the Brazil midfielder Fernandinho from Shakhtar Donetsk and the Spanish winger Jesús Navas from Seville after discovering evidence of possible breaches of security.
The Scout7 company was bought by the Perform Group in 2017. It is viewed as a world leader in providing a database of detailed player statistics and information. It also provides subscribers with video clips and footage of age-group tournaments that may not be available elsewhere. Users can compile reports on possible targets and share them with other people from their club who also use the system.
The database details where and when tournaments are being played, and has a list of players who are out of contract, which helps clubs looking to strengthen their squad via free transfers, or outside of the transfer window.
After the reports in June 2013 of the alleged access to City’s scouting system, Scout7 issued a statement saying the integrity of its system remained intact.
The statement read: “We understand that the incident is still being investigated but involves use of valid passwords obtained from the club concerned to gain illegal access to a private database. The security or technical integrity of Scout7 systems has not been undermined by this incident.
“Scout7 point out that the security and confidentiality of client’s databases has always been and remains of the utmost importance and protecting club’s private data continues to be an integral feature of our systems.”
Q&A: THE ‘SPYING’ ROW
Hacking into another club’s system, as Liverpool have been alleged to have done, is presumably contrary to Premier League rules?
It certainly appears to be clearly in breach of the Premier League rule that clubs must behave with “utmost good faith” towards each other. The EFL has a similar rule, and it used that to fine Leeds United £200,000 over its own “spygate” scandal last season when their promotion rivals Derby County complained about the Yorkshire club sending someone to watch them training.
In that case, why has the Premier League not already launched an investigation into the reports that Manchester City complained to Liverpool that their database had been hacked?
It is understood that no complaint was received by the Premier League, and its policy is that if any dispute between two clubs has been resolved between them it does not need to get involved. The fact the settlement was agreed in 2013 also means there is a feeling that a lot of time has already passed.
Is there any possible breach of FA rules?
The FA has a catch-all rule in its handbook about misconduct, which states that participants (which include clubs, county associations and officials, as well as players) must not do anything that brings the game into disrepute. It could certainly be argued that hacking into another club’s database is bringing the game into disrepute.
What is the next likely development in this saga?
If City provide full details of its case to the FA, the governing body may feel it has to contact Liverpool for their observations. After that, a decision would have to be taken by the FA as to whether any disciplinary proceedings should be open
