U.S. seizes 400 domains used to pirate World Cup streams

Federal agents seized nearly 400 internet domains on Friday, June 26, in a sweep aimed at sites streaming 2026 World Cup matches in real time without authorization. The Justice Department named the action Operation Offsides and said the domains were identified with help from FIFA, beIN Media Group, NBC Universal, the Motion Picture Association’s Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment, the Ultimate Fighting Championship and Warner Bros.

The takedown landed as the first 48-team World Cup moves through 104 matches across the United States, Mexico and Canada, with the tournament running from June 11 through July 19. FIFA said 281,223 fans passed through turnstiles on June 16, setting a new single-day attendance record, and that 1,309,652 supporters had attended after six days. The governing body says the tournament is on course to top the all-time cumulative attendance mark of 3.5 million set at the 1994 World Cup.

The seizure shows how aggressively the United States is willing to police digital sports distribution when the commercial stakes are highest. Broadcasters, leagues, sponsors and FIFA all benefit when viewers are steered toward authorized feeds that protect rights fees and ad revenue; consumers benefit only when they can reach legal, stable streams without being pushed toward risky workarounds. Federal officials said the sites were offering copyright-protected content while matches were being played, and Homeland Security Investigations and the Justice Department warned that illegal streaming pages can expose users to malware and insecure connections that compromise personal and financial data.

The enforcement effort also fits into a wider campaign against sports-related cybercrime. On May 27, the FBI warned that actors were spoofing FIFA websites to steal personal information, sell fake World Cup tickets and hospitality products, and carry out other scams. In Europe, a separate anti-piracy push, Operation Kratos 2, removed more than 27,000 illegal streaming URLs, led to 29 arrests, identified 86 suspects and dismantled nine organized criminal groups across 13 countries. Together, the cases suggest that domain seizures can cut off access at scale, but they do not end piracy so much as force it into a moving contest between enforcement and evasion.