Legal Challenges in Sports Journalism
Data protection, privacy law and player performance data — how far is too far?
Sports present a breadth of legal challenges and complications, and in order to understand simply the domain and influence of the legal complexities facing journalist in contemporary society, we will be looking exclusively at football. Now, many of these issues discussed are interchangeable with a range of other sports but initially we will focus on the world of football.
Sports journalism is predominantly online and in an ever adapting digital environment, this presents legal challenges and difficulties that are often never talked about, hidden or behind blurred lines.
The rise and prominence of social media means that everyone online is a gatekeeper of news, which presents issues of manipulation, defamation and dissemination.
Overview of the legal challenges faced in the industry of sports journalism:
We take a deep dive into the world of sports law and look at some of the key issues to consider.
Data protection
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) laws prohibit the exploitation of athletes and sports while regulating governing bodies in which directly impacts commercial and regulatory functions.
Governance: Organisations will have increased responsibility and accountability on how they control and process personal data.
Consent: A more active consent based model is introduced; wherever consent is required for data to be processed, consent must be explicit, rather than implied.
Transparency: Organisations will have increased transparency obligations.
Data processors: Organisations processing data on behalf of other companies will be required to comply with a number of specific data protection related obligations.
Enforcement: Stronger enforcement means non-compliance could lead to much heavier, turnover based sanctions.
Privacy law
Athletes are viewed as role models and their public image needs to be protected and valued.
Public figures have almost no right to privacy, even when the published information is false.
However, is there an argument that people should be safeguarded and have their privacy protected more effectively?
Libel and defamation
Defamation is the publication to a third party of a statement about you which has caused or is likely to cause serious harm to your reputation. The defamatory publication will either be a libel or a slander.
Defamation is often separated into two forms:
- Libel: a written defamatory statement found in newspapers, online publications, social media and other means of publications.
2. Slander: a spoken defamatory statement.
Libel tends to lower an individual’s or group’s reputation in the public and in the view of society. However, there are means to protect individuals and groups likewise and unlike any other civil or legal proceedings, the burden of proof is on the media defendant.
Journalists’ responsibilities
Strict guidelines are put into sanction to protect athletes and people whose reputation may be the subject of libel and defamation. Newspapers and sports journalists are often subjected to rigorous investigations to the invasion of privacy and the breaching of data protection acts. Although this is an effective way to produce ‘news’ with strategies like clickbait that target an individual or group of individuals, these laws are put in place to protect the private lives of those at risk.
In a previous blog, we discuss the capabilities that journalists’ and news outlets have to influence the opinions of the masses. It is the responsibilities of these platforms to provide the safety and security of a fairer media through gatekeeping and responsible journalism.
Player performance data and ‘Project Red Card’
It may seem like a completely natural part of the game and you may have never questioned it before, but athletes are fighting to take legal action over the use of performance-tracking data and statistics.
“More than 400 current and former players have signed up to pursue gaming, betting and data-processing companies who utilise their personal statistics without consent or compensation.”
Athlete performance data is everywhere and is often available in public domain. Some analytics companies even track over 5,000 datapoints per game and this offers a huge commercial standpoint for sports and betting companies.
“In sport, athletes’ personal data is used for registration and record-keeping, to analyse and improve performance, to improve the fan experience and other commercial purposes.”
Project Red Card
The initiative, lead by former Cardiff City manager Russell Slade, aims to serve justice to football players, stating that “players’ performance data is actually personal data, and is being exploited for financial gain without their consent.”
Project Red Card aims to provide protection to players and claims that player performance data is potentially damaging to the careers of athletes. Data is often misleading and can be improperly framed, presenting the danger to position athletes in harmful positions, such as a defamatory publication of libel which damages the reputation of a player.
“The details of their passing accuracy, their fitness, their speed, all of those things which you see in various guises on countless websites or games — that’s how players are assessed now.
The simple message is: in order to do that you need a player’s consent, and you ain’t got it.”
The initiative aims to give power back to the players who can be in control of sensitive and personal data.
So, how far is too far?
Sports news has adapted to a 24/7 news cycle and sports journalists are reporting and covering more than they ever have before. With digital publications and platforms like The Athletic, we are also seeing news faster, more in-depth and more widely available than ever. Compared to print journalism and print news, this is an industry-shaking improvement which has enhanced the experience for its audience. But is this new wave of journalism potentially damaging to players?
As digital journalism and media develops even further, there will be more hurdles to jump and more legal challenges to overcome. This is just the start.
I hope you enjoyed reading about my thoughts on the legal challenges sports journalists face in a discussion that ponders; how far is too far? I would love to hear your thoughts about the industry and the regulations set and if they’re enough to protect athletes.
Follow me on Medium to keep up to date with posts about relevant sports journalism topics and follow my Twitter, Facebook and Instagram here for daily updates.
