BREAKING - Arsenal release statement on ticket touts after fans have memberships suspended

Arsenal have reinstated 332 previously suspended club memberships following a targeted operation which has seen 16 lead members permanently deactivated. The operation comes as the club continues its crackdown on ticket touting leading to the successful identification of users operating unauthorised software to secure tickets before selling them on.

football.london reached out to the club for comment and they provided the following statement: “This was one of our targeted operations aimed at stamping out ticket touting. Together with our supporters we care deeply about this issue and we continue to take strong action against members who break our terms and conditions to buy tickets. We remind all supporters to only buy tickets through our official ticketing platform and the Ticket Exchange, and not by unauthorised means.”

In the past couple of years, the club has made efforts to mitigate the impact of both bot activity and touting in an attempt to improve the accessibility of tickets to a larger portion of the fan base. The introduction of the ballot system and the software that aims to shut down these bot accounts are two such methods.

In March of last year, football.londonwas told by the club that more than 300,000 suspected bots had been blocked. In the time since the club have announced further accounts have been blocked.

The demand for tickets at the Emirates Stadium in the past couple of seasons has increased dramatically leading to touts seeking to exploit the situation. Fans are rightfully advised only to purchase tickets through the club's official channels and not from any third party or individual.

It is understood that the club will not be able to provide refunds for the tickets which have been cancelled on all of