One of the "key milestones" out of the Hillsborough disaster was the "outlawing of the second-hand market on tickets" for matches involving teams from the U.K., legislation that came into force partly as a result of Britain's worst sporting tragedy, according to Ben Rumsby of the London TELEGRAPH. The Criminal Justice & Public Order Act 1994 has "helped keep rival fans apart within stadiums both in Britain and overseas and has been credited along with all-seater stadia with all but eliminating hooliganism from English grounds." The act has "arguably never been more critical ahead of this summer’s European Championship, which is facing security threats on a whole different scale following recent terrorist atrocities that saw football targeted." Security plans are in "danger of being undermined by those attempting to defy -- and potentially break -- the law governing second-hand tickets." Viagogo -- which has at various junctures had partnerships with ManU, Man City and Chelsea -- "has been shamelessly allowing" the unauthorized sale of Euro 2016 tickets to its U.K.-based users, including for matches involving England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It is "doing so in a way it knows makes a mockery of the law on second-hand tickets but is counting on protecting it from prosecution." Until this week, Viagogo was allowing U.K.-based users to browse Euro 2016 tickets on the site's .co.uk web address "before being transferred to a Swiss (.ch) version of the site in order to complete the formalities of the transaction." When asked to explain its policy, it said in a statement, "We do not permit the sale of Euro 2016 tickets from viagogo.co.uk." Viagogo is "not alone among the major secondary-market operators in circumventing the law," with StubHub also allowing U.K.-based customers to buy Euro 2016 tickets via its German (.de) website. StubHub Global Communications Head Glenn Lehrman said, "There are no laws in Germany that prohibit the resale of these tickets and we cannot prevent a fan from transacting on a non-U.K. site" (TELEGRAPH, 4/27).
