THE International Olympic Committee has established a hotline on which it hopes whistle-blowers will report match-fixing and other corruption.

Open to athletes, coaches, referees, and members of the public, it guarantees secrecy and even "100% anonymity".

It was announced on Monday in Lausanne, at the inaugural International Forum for Sports Integrity which is designed to help protect the Olympic Games and other competitions.

Chaired by IOC president Thomas Bach, this sports summit was launched with the backing of the Council of Europe, and was attended by a battery of high-level dignitaries representing the EU, Interpol, Europol, UN, the Association of National Olympic Committees, the Association of Summer and Winter Olympic International Federations, sports betting operators, national Olympic committees and governments - Britain's Department of Culture Media and Sport among them.

The British Olympic Association, however was not, and the presence of only the national Olympic committees of Russia, China, Italy, and Germany, leads one to wonder if the matter is lower on the priority list than it should be.

A BOA spokesperson said she believes the forum was "by invitation only" and based on an original working group. "The BOA is certainly committed to sports integrity." The IOC media office was unable to comment on the turn-out as most of their number were on a flight to New York.

Match-fixing is rife across the globe, making lurid headlines. Sport betting figures beggar belief. In England, £855m was wagered on 120 Premiership matches during the first three months of last year alone - yet that's chicken-feed compared to Hong Kong where the betting market was worth US$64.5bn in 2013.

Delroy Facey, a former West Brom player who appeared for several other clubs, and Moses Swaibu, are in a Birmingham court this week on charges relating to an international match-fixing conspiracy. Two businessmen and a player convicted of plotting to manipulate results have already been jailed for five years, and 16 months respectively. It was said they conspired to recruit a network of corrupt players across the UK.

FIFPro, which represents all professional footballers, hosted a "Fight against the Manipulation of Sport" conference last year. It cited Michel Platini's belief that gambling and match-fixing is the biggest threat facing the future of the sport in Europe, and highlighted the potential for criminality in a multi-billion unregulated global industry.

The SFA Keep It Clean campaign has operated an anonymous hotline since January last year (dealing with match-fixing, illegal betting, and doping).

Olympic betting is in its infancy, but the movement monitors betting patterns during the Games, and dare not be complacent. Bach has described doping as the biggest threat facing sport, but this week's conference focused on fighting match-fixing, irregular betting and manipulation, and related corruption. The movement already funds initiatives with Interpol, and is implementing mandatory Integrity E-learning for athletes, officials, and IOC/NOC staff. This week it pledged an additional £10m to anti-corruption in this area, plus a further $10m to anti-doping.

"The ultimate goal of all this is to protect the clean athletes and to give them, as far as we can, fair competition," said Bach.

FIFA, UEFA, and the World Anti-Doping Agency, already encourage whistle-blowers, as do national agencies such as UK Anti-Doping which established a hotline nearly five years ago. Perhaps not surprising that an organisation staffed by former police officers should come up with a plan to encourage snouts to provide evidence.

Critics might suggest such a system affords scope for the malicious to direct suspicion at innocent athletes and rivals. Yet there is a strong impression that whistle-blowing has done more to expose high-level cheats than the formal test programme. Marion Jones, Tim Montgomery, Dwain Chambers, and Lance Armstrong were all brought down by whistle-blowers. Indeed, in the US, more cheats have been outed on such tip-offs than by the tens of millions invested in anti-doping.

The IOC will hope for greater uptake with their hotline than Scottish football has had with theirs.

"Since we launched it in January 2014, we have not had a single phone call to that Crimestoppers phone number," said the SFA's security and integrity officer, Peter McLaughlin.

"My glass is half full, so we don't have a problem in Sottish football," said the former police superintendent, "but we can't be complacent. If your glass is half empty, then players, match officlals, managers, and coaches, don't have enough confidence to report it.

"Match-fixing is on our risk register. It's a serious threat to the game. In conjunction with PFA Scotland I have gone round all 42 clubs in the SPFL, and delivered integrity presentations to first-team and development squad players."

He highlights issues around fixing, and also betting, given recent instances involving the Rangers goalkeeper Steve Simonsen.

There have been four presentations to the managers and coaches' association in the past two months, and one is shortly planned for senior referees.

"We can only educate. If somebody has the desire to get involved, well, if we catch them they will be banned for life from football across the globe, not just Scotland.

"It's getting nearer and nearer. It's been in Asia, eastern Europe, Italy, Spain, Germany, Holland, England. Whilst we have had no reported cases in Scotland we can't be complacent and simply try to be ahead of the game as much as we can."

He warns players about the potential risks: "how players may be groomed, a round of drinks, use of a car, a flat, good-looking girls. We try to teach them to be wary of unscrupulous individuals trying to befriend them and gain their confidence. There's evidence to suggest these kind of things have happened in Europe and elsewhere."

All this is on the back of the FIFPro programme which has been running since 2012.

Cricket, football, baseball, basketball, gridiron, have all had their scandals. Three of these are Olympic sports. The greater the financial reward, the higher the risk, and it seems simply a matter of time before the Olympic Charter's "respect for universal fundamental ethical principles" is made a mockery by fixers.

The infamous 1988 drug-fuelled 100-metres victory by Ben Johnson in Seoul would seem a minor offence by comparison. At least he tried to win.