MUMBAI: There’s reason to celebrate at Disney Star India. The media behemoth’s anti-piracy cell – led by Major Ashok Yadav – has – with the help of the Ahmedabad police - managed to crack down on a clutch of betting websites which were illegally running ICC T20 World Cup cricket streams.

“What’s alarming is the number of betting websites that have popped up this time during this World Cup and they are running live match video streams simultaneously. These guys at magicwin.games, magicwin.com were streaming the matches and encouraging youngsters to place bets,” said Yadav “We filed an FIR and asked help from the cybercrime cell in Ahmedabad and it has since been blocked from running the video streams. It’s to the police commissioner’s credit that it was brought down in 10 days and the pirate arrested.”

The cybercrime cell led by Lavina Sinha along with ACP Hardik Mankadiya have named three accused Divyanshu Patel, Shubham Patel and Harsh Patel, According to both Sinha and Mankadiya, the match video feed was being provided to Divyanshu from a cable operator in Pakistan who goes by the name of Azhar, while Shubham – who is based in Canada - would bring in customers from overseas. The police have arrested Divyanshu, who is a website developer from Mehsana district in Gujarat, and another member of the ring Omkumar Goswami whose job was to open bank accounts in which the betting money was deposited. Laptops, routers, encoders, personal servers have all been recovered from Divyanshu’s premises. Additionally, an international lookout notice has been issued against Shubham Patel.

“Servers were running in Winnipeg, Russia, Germany to keep this operation going,” said Mankadiya.

For the police, the larger crime of illegal betting is something that they are further chasing.

Investigations are currently ongoing around the fintech company that was involved in the UPI transactions for betting transfers while also looking into the media agency which had placed billboards throughout Ahmedabad promoting magicwin.

“Celebrities like Vidyut Jamal were endorsing magicwin without really knowing what they were doing,” said Mankadiya.

“We hope the new advertising regulations will help make these celebs more aware and be careful about what they are promoting,” said a media professional.

Shall we say Amen to that!