The official Olympic Channel by the IOC on YouTube, which offers visitors free live streaming of the 2012 Olympic Games, is not available in South Africa. Many South Africans are using unofficial streaming sites to watch the Olympics live, but Supersport warns that it is illegal.
SuperSport previously explained that they have exclusive Internet rights in South Africa for the 2012 Olympic Games, which is why the YouTube Olympics channel is not supported in South Africa.
“SuperSport.com is streaming all four of our Olympic channels live so that subscribers have access to the live action wherever they happen to be,” said SuperSport Communications Manager Clinton van der Berg.
The Supersport live Olympic streaming is only available to DStv subscribers, but this is not stopping non-DStv Internet users from streaming the event online.
Numerous international websites are offering free online streaming of the 2012 London Olympic Games, including FirstRow Sports, Sportlemon and LiveTV.ru.
These streams typically come from official broadcasters like BBC or Sky, and are then made available freely through these websites.
2012 Olympic Games streaming at Sportlemon
Other tech-savvy people are making use of proxy servers or a virtual private network (VPN) to provide a ‘fake’ IP address to give them access to streaming TV services in other countries. By using a proxy or VPN users can stream the Olympic Games from countries which block this streaming outside the country.
However, van der Berg said that that these unofficial streaming websites are not legal. He added that using these sites to watch the 2012 London Olympic Games live is also illegal.
“In a word – illegal, illegal, illegal,” said van der Berg in response to questions about the legality of widely available live streaming websites in other countries, and South Africans using these websites for Olympics streaming.
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