Roja Directa is a directory of sports streaming links, created in Spain in the early 2000s. The site does not stream any video itself: it aggregates links to broadcasts hosted on third-party servers. In France, the courts ordered its blocking by internet service providers at the request of La Liga. However, the site remains accessible from many countries, and its audience abroad continues to grow.
DNS Blocking in France: What the Measure Prevents and What It Does Not
The mechanism adopted by French courts is based on a DNS-level blocking by internet service providers. When a user enters the address of Roja Directa, the request is redirected to an error page or a prohibition message.
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The site itself is not taken offline. Its servers remain active, hosted outside French territory. An internet user located in Belgium, Switzerland, or Latin America accesses the platform without any restrictions.
This type of blocking has a structural limitation: it only affects the domain name resolution by the local ISP. Manually changing DNS settings or using a virtual private network is technically sufficient to bypass the restriction. Several French-speaking users continue to access it via a link to access Roja Directa shared on forums or social networks.
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ARCOM Law and Dynamic Blocking of Sports Mirrors
The blocking of Roja Directa is part of a legal framework that has significantly evolved in recent years. The law of October 25, 2021, known as the ARCOM law, created a specific mechanism for illegal sports broadcasts, complemented by the decree of June 23, 2022.
The novelty compared to previous blocking procedures lies in a specific point: French judges can now order the blocking not only of the main site but also of its mirrors and substitute domain names, without having to return to court for each new address. This is the principle of dynamic blocking.
For a directory like Roja Directa, which regularly changes its address, this evolution complicates the circumvention strategy on the publisher’s side. Each new mirror can be blocked within a reduced timeframe, upon simple notification to ISPs by the rights holders.
The European Dimension of the Mechanism
France is not acting alone. The Court of Justice of the European Union validated, in a ruling at the end of 2023 (case C-339/22, La Liga and Movistar+), the principle of blocks ordered by judges to combat unauthorized sports streaming, including through dynamic injunctions against internet service providers.
Several regulatory authorities in Spain, Italy, and Portugal have relied on this case law to extend their own mechanisms. The movement of restriction is therefore no longer limited to France, even if the concrete application varies from country to country.
Why Roja Directa Remains Popular Outside France
The model of Roja Directa is based on a decentralized architecture. The site does not store any video content. It simply references streams hosted elsewhere. This structure makes it difficult to dismantle from a single country, as removing the site in one jurisdiction does not eliminate the source streams or the directory itself.
Several factors explain the persistence of its audience abroad:
- The cost of legal sports subscriptions remains high in many countries, and the fragmentation of rights sometimes forces users to subscribe to multiple platforms to follow a single championship.
- The interface of Roja Directa, minimalistic, displays ongoing and upcoming matches with direct links, without registration or subscription.
- In some Latin American or African countries, legal broadcasts of European championships are simply not available, pushing football fans towards this type of platform.
Free access is not the only driving force. The lack of accessible legal offerings remains a determining factor in several regions of the world.
Legal and Technical Risks for French Users
Accessing a blocked site in France via a VPN does not constitute a criminal offense in itself. The use of a VPN is legal. The nuance lies in how it is used: consuming content broadcast without the rights holders’ authorization may expose the user to legal action, even though cases of conviction of mere viewers remain rare in practice.
The most concrete risk for the user does not actually come from the justice system. Free streaming sites expose users to well-identified technical threats:
- Redirections to phishing pages or fake login forms.
- Intrusive ads containing malicious scripts capable of installing unwanted software.
- Collection of browsing data without consent, sold to opaque advertising agencies.
Illegal streaming platforms monetize their audience through aggressive advertising, not through a reliable service. The absence of regulation in these spaces leaves room for practices that legal agencies do not permit.
Legal Sports Offer and Fragmentation of Rights in Europe
The landscape of sports rights in Europe directly contributes to the popularity of platforms like Roja Directa. A football fan wishing to follow La Liga, the Premier League, and the Champions League often has to subscribe to several distinct subscriptions, the cumulative cost of which reaches significant amounts.
This fragmentation pushes part of the audience towards free solutions, even at the cost of image quality and security. The problem is not only financial: it is also related to the complexity of the offering. Knowing which match is on which platform can sometimes be a puzzle.
As long as legal access to live sports remains fragmented and expensive, the demand for directories like Roja Directa will not disappear. Technical blocking slows access in a given country, but does not address the root cause of demand. The next step, for rights holders as well as regulators, involves both adapting the commercial offering and strengthening blocking measures.