Sportradar unveils athlete protection service to combat social media abuse
Launch follows successful trial in Exo-Tennis Series this summer where participating players were targeted online
Sportradar Integrity Services has unveiled a ground-breaking solution to help sports organisations safeguard professional athletes from trolls and abuse on social media.
Available to all sports federations, leagues and governing bodies, the service identifies those behind the anonymous ‘troll’ or ‘burner’ accounts used to aim online abuse at sports stars.
Besides providing a location of the ‘troll’, Sportradar is able to build a picture of how the person or persons behind the social media account carries out online abuse.
The findings are then shared with Sportradar’s partners and additional support is provided in pursuing the appropriate course of action, including the removal of offending accounts from social media platforms and collaborating with police.
The product was trialled at this summer’s Exo-Tennis Series across Germany and the US, where players from the ATP and WTA Tours, including Germany’s Dustin Brown and US pair Taylor Townsend and Sachia Vickery, shared abusive messages they’d received.
According to an article in yesterday’s Sunday Telegraph, the betting data company discovered the real identities of 21 culprits from 12 countries behind 70 abusive messages. BAME and female players were on the receiving end of much of the attacks, primarily conducted on Twitter and Instagram.
Sportradar was able to provide event organisers with details of the accounts and a set of recommendations on the best course of action to prevent future trolling and abuse.
Andreas Krannich, MD of Sportradar Integrity Services, said: “With this new service, we’ve strengthened our position in this space by safeguarding the athletes who compete in it and protecting them from online harm and social media abuse.
“We are providing a tangible output that our partners can share with their athletes and we’re providing support to those partners in pursuing an appropriate course of action.
“The service we now have in place can act as a deterrent to future online abuse and create real change, particularly when people see the impact it has.”