• •OONI researchers confirmed that Spanish ISPs are using IP-based blocking to prevent access to unlicensed football streaming sites.
• •The blocking technique frequently sweeps up innocent infrastructure, including unrelated websites and services sharing the same IP address.
• •The scale and legal oversight of these blocking mandates remain unclear, as ISPs often implement them without granular public disclosure.

Spanish ISPs have begun using IP-based blocking to restrict access to unauthorized LaLiga football streams, according to a report from OONI. This blunt-force method differs from more precise DNS or SNI filtering because it indiscriminately cuts off all traffic to a target IP, affecting any unrelated services hosted on the same server. While the practice aims to protect broadcasting rights, it creates significant collateral damage for legitimate websites caught in the net. The long-term impact on the Spanish digital landscape remains uncertain, as regulators have yet to address the disproportionate impact on non-infringing web traffic.