The 2026 World Cup and dynamic blockages: streaming challenges

In this forum, Mario Arcos Miró, lawyer in Bardají & Honrado, analyzes the intersection between the fight against piracy and the broadcasting of content via streaming, an area in which LaLiga has been especially active and which will address its biggest challenge to date with the broadcast of the 2026 World Cup. In this area, the tournament's co-host, Mexico, is exploring models to guarantee the protection of content.

In the digital age, the value of a live sporting event is huge, but also ephemeral. Millions of euros in broadcast rights They are played in the ninety minutes of a soccer match, in the sets of a tennis final or in the rounds of a grand prix. However, this valuable exclusivity is threatened by a phenomenon against which the main holders of these rights have been fighting for years: piracy in line.

The ease and speed of accessing these portals for retransmitting pirated content has made users legal systems of different countries look for solutions to this phenomenon. In this context, Spain has positioned itself at the forefront with a model dynamic locking judicially consolidated, while Mexico, with an eye on the 2026 World Cup, explores possible means of protection to the diffusion content pirate.

The Spanish model: judicial and technological vanguard

Contrary to popular belief, in Spain there is no “football law” created for this to prosecute piracy. The Spanish strategy is based on a robust legal ecosystem that interweaves three fundamental pillars: intellectual property legislation, the service regulations digital and a strict judicial control.

To understand this protection system, we must begin by saying that a Sports broadcasting is not considered an “artistic work”. In this sense, the Ruling 546/2022 of the Supreme Court, rejecting its penal fit as a literary, artistic or scientific work or performance for the purposes of art. 270 of the Penal Code, without denying the protection of audiovisual recordings by related rights, thus recognizing it as a protected “performance.” Organizers and broadcasters have rights exploitation exclusives, among them that of public communication, and the violation of these rights is what enables the owners, such as LaLiga, to exercise the actions for injunction and compensation for damages contemplated in article 138 of the TRLPI.

During the broadcast of the event, rights holders monitor the network and, upon detecting new pirate sources, they communicate them directly for your immediate blocking, all under the umbrella of the original judicial authorization.

The second main point of the Spanish strategy when it comes to protecting these benefits is the Law of Information Society Services. The great importance of this law lies in the fact that it allows a competent body order intermediary service providers (such as Internet access providers or ISP) that interrupt the provision of a service or remove content that violate intellectual property rights. This law maintains a rights guarantor aspect, since it requires prior judicial authorization when the measure may affect fundamental rights such as freedom of expression, judicial control that is essential when differentiating blocking orders from administrative censorship.

In this matter, Spain does not act or legislate in isolation, but rather does so through the transposition of different European Directives such as Directive 2001/29/EC (InfoSoc) and Directive 2004/48/EC (Enforcement). These rules oblige Member States to ensure that right holders can request court orders against intermediaries whose services are used to commit violations. The European Parliament, in its resolution of 19 May 2021, urged the Commission to propose measures that allow the removal or blocking “in real time” of illegal sports content, recognizing the urgency imposed by the nature of live events, since this is the most important characteristic of all this casuistry, the broadcast of live events means that the performance must be almost instantaneous, giving birth to what is known as a “dynamic block.”

Although the effectiveness of this model is undeniable, it is not exempt from controversy. It raises serious debates about the risk of “overlock", when blocking full IP addresses instead of a specific URL.

This figure of dynamic blocking has been consolidated by resolutions such as Sentence 310/2024 of the Commercial Court No. 6 of Barcelona. To a large extent, this form of blocking was born in response to the tactics used by offenders, based on Constantly changing domain or IP address to bypass static blocks. The importance of dynamic blocking is that dynamic blocking not only authorizes the blocking of an initial list of identified websites, but establishes a agile procedure to update it.

During the broadcast of the event, rights holders monitor the network and, upon detecting new pirate sources, they communicate them directly for your immediate blocking, all under the umbrella of the original judicial authorization. The need for measures to be take almost immediately y automatic justify that it can be operated from a judicial authorization only, extending the effects of this previous judicial resolution, instead of needing authorization for each of the blockades.

Although the effectiveness of this model is undeniable, it is not exempt from controversy. It raises serious debates about the risk of “overlock", when blocking full IP addresses instead of a specific URL, which means that the blockage affects pages that have nothing to do with illegitimate broadcasting of content and its impact on network neutrality and the right of access to information. The key to its legitimacy lies in the proportionality of the measure and continuous judicial supervision.

The Mexican challenge: towards its own regulatory framework

Mexico, as co-host of the 2026 World Cup, is in a turning point since the Mexican government has expressed its intention to combat the sports piracy, granting the Mexican Institute of Industrial Property (IMPI) a central role in monitoring and blocking offending sites.

The main legal basis is the Federal Copyright Law (LFDA), which empowers the IMPI to impose measures and sanction infractions. However, the Mexican framework presents substantial differences with Spanish. The implementation of a dynamic locking system, especially if it is intended to be administrative in nature and not strictly judicial, faces important constitutional debates. In this sense, the main difference that we could find is that Mexico seems to rely more clearly on a administrative axis-IMPI, with subsequent control by protection and with a different network neutrality and information freedom infrastructure.

The feasibility of a dynamic locking system It depends not only on the law, but also on the IMPI technical capacity and of the cooperation of Internet intermediaries.

The main challenges are, first of all, provide guarantees to the process, since an administrative blocking system, without a prior and specific court order, could be questioned for not guaranteeing the right of hearing of the alleged offenders. On the other hand, the freedom of expression and access to information, since blocking measures, by their nature, can restrict the flow of information.

It must be taken into account that the Mexican jurisprudence has traditionally been very protective regarding these rights, which would require that any blocking measure be strictly necessary and proportional. As a last point, we must emphasize that the feasibility of a dynamic locking system It depends not only on the law, but also on the IMPI technical capacity and of the cooperation of Internet intermediaries.

Mexico before one of the biggest sporting events in its history

The replication of the Spanish model in Mexico It is not a simple task, since it requires the creating robust safeguards, probably anchored in reinforced judicial control, to ensure its compatibility with Mexican constitutional principles.

The European and Spanish experience suggests a series of good practices that could guide the development of future regulatory frameworks:

1. Proportionality in blocking: Prioritize blocking at the URL or specific domain level before blocking entire IP addresses, to minimize the risk of affecting legitimate content.

2. Temporality of the measures: Blocking orders for live events must be temporary, limited to the duration of the event, and reviewable periodically.

3. Judicial supervision: Maintain judicial protection as the central axis of the system, guaranteeing that a judge authorizes and supervises the measures, especially those of a dynamic nature.

4. Transparency and recourse: Ensure that procedures are transparent and that there are effective and rapid remedies for those affected by a possible erroneous block.