A dedicated security team will be set up for the first time to identify illegal betting practices and attempts to fix events at the London 2012 Games.
Olympics Minister Hugh Robertson said that betting syndicates, who attempt to bribe athletes into influencing the outcome of their event, pose the biggest risk to the reputation of the London games.
“You cannot underestimate the threat this poses because the moment that spectators start to feel that what they are seeing is not a true contest, that is when spectators stop turning up and the whole thing turns to pieces,” he told the Sunday Times.
“At some stage over the next two or three years, we will have some other sort of betting scandal in some sport. I just hope it’s not at the Olympics.”
The specialist police intelligence unit will be led by the Metropolitan Police, and will work with the Serious Organised Crime Agency and Interpol to monitor suspicious activity abroad.
Mr Robertson said that gambling activity abroad posed the biggest threat. Western betting authorities are “well set up” to spot illegal betting activities, he said, but he criticised regulation in the Far East and sub-continent.
“If you look at the most high-profile incident – the Pakistani cricketers [caught spot fixing] at Lord’s – the issue is not of betting syndicates in this part of the world. It is illegal betting syndicates in the Indian sub-continent and elsewhere, where huge sums of money change hands.”
The International Olympic Committee is also involved, and has created a unit to monitor the global betting market for any unusually large wagers on particular events or competitors.