[SuperSajuuk]

Surely "ITV" wouldn't be involved in anything here, as they neither made or distribute the show.

Why wouldn’t they be? All the original series were produced for ITV (and Chris namechecks them plenty of times in the early series, namely at phone-a-friends) and Challenge said back in 2014 that it was ITV who found the original broadcast tapes from these series and passed them over for airing [with obligatory phone number/casting sections edited out/covered up]. While the rights are owned by Sony now, ITV were the ones who commissioned the programme to be made by Celador at the time, so in essence ITV are relevant, as Sony never actually had the tapes when they bought the rights in 2008 [they only had the tapes from Series 5 onwards, which were the Virgin bodges].