Illegal live-streamers stopped at Joseph Parker fight night

Duco Event's Dean Lonergan and David Higgins with Joseph Parker at a press conference in May. Photo / Andrew Cornaga of Photosport

Event organisers have stopped people attempting to illegally live-stream the Joseph Parker fight night.

Parker is tonight facing giant Ukraine Alexander Dimitrenko at Manukau's Vodafone Events Centre.

Several other fights have taken place in the lead up to the main event, including The Bachelor NZ runner up Naz Khanjani versus Paul Henry's daughter Bella, and Parker's younger brother, John, 22, versus Ratu Dawai, of Christchurch.

Khanjani and John Parker won their fights.

As of 10.30pm, event staff had stopped two people who were streaming the fight, Duco Events chief executive Martin Snedden said. They were allowed to continue to watch the fights.

Sky is charging $39.95 to view the fight, which is also available on its Fanpass platform.

However, it hasn't been smooth-sailing, with Sky's website also crashing leaving frustrated fans unable to book to watch the fight.

The Herald revealed this morning Duco Events and Sky Television had filed court proceedings against eight individuals who illegally live-streamed Joseph Parker's last fight.

They promised to "up the ante" should others ignore their hard line.

The eight people, all based in New Zealand, face nominal fines of $2670 each for breach of copyright for the streaming of Kiwi heavyweight Parker's victory over Australian Solomon Haumono in Christchurch in July.

"We're not going to sit by and watch people steal our stuff," Duco chief executive Martin Snedden said.

"I've heard lots of discussion about 'are we charging too much', and I think that's a complete red herring.

"The fact is if we charge too much, don't buy it. It doesn't give you the right to steal it and that's what these people are doing and they are facilitating other people to steal it."

Snedden said Duco and Sky had teams concentrating on chasing people who live-streamed events.

"We haven't taken a punitive approach to how much we're claiming in the court proceedings this time around, we're just making the point.

"If people ignore this warning we'll up the ante next time around and put a lot more attention into claiming damages."