The European Sports Security Association (ESSA) is a non-profit organisation whose members are the leading online sports book operators in Europe. It was initiated in 2005 as a result of the "Hoyzer affair" (a German football scandal involving a referee called Robert Hoyzer) which led to the land based/offline German state monopoly to lose millions of euros because they lacked the means to detect betting patterns.

While the ‘Hoyzer affair’ did not impact the online gambling operators, it nevertheless acted as a catalyst for them to work together to share information about games that they found suspicious.  Cooperation was facilitated by the fact that the internet is the best transparency tool, where every transaction can be monitored, registered and traced. Online gambling companies employ state-of-the-art tools to ensure that gaming behaviour and money transfers are recorded and checked for suspicious transactions.

In 2005 the leading online operators in the EU formed the European Sports Security Association (ESSA) with a mandate to keep sport clean and free from manipulation.  To achieve this goal, ESSA has implemented an early warning system between its members that highlights any irregular betting patterns or possible insider betting from within each sport.

The Early Warning System allows ESSA to work hand in hand with the Sports Regulators and their disciplinary and legal department, ensuring that when an alert is given the regulator is informed immediately which may prevent the possibility of any game manipulation on a given event.

So far, ESSA has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with FIFA, UEFA, EPFL, The FA, DFB, ATP , ITF, WTA and has established close relations with the IOC and many other sports regulators.