Tennis officials revealed Thursday that “angry players” accounted for nearly half of abusive social media posts targeting tennis’ biggest stars.
The AI-powered threat matrix, launched by the ITF, WTA, Wimbledon and US Open, analyzed nearly 2.5 million posts on X, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook and TikTok between January and October of this year.
Of this number, “around 12,000” abusive messages were identified.
The four governing bodies specified that “angry players”, who bet on matches and express their frustration on social networks when their bets fail, represent 48% of abusive messages detected in 2024.
“An increase in the volume of abusive content was observed during Grand Slam tournaments”, which allows their authors to benefit from greater “visibility” given the “interest” aroused by tennis during these events that last two weeks.
“The identities of 15 perpetrators of highly abusive accounts were forwarded to domestic law enforcement for action,” the report said.
“Abusers should be under no illusion: we will pursue criminal charges wherever possible, seek to exclude them from access to major social media platforms and ban them from attending our events.”
Victoria Azarenka, a former women’s world number one and two-time Grand Slam champion, said she welcomed attempts to “create a healthier online environment”.
“Social media has become an integral part of our daily lives and, therefore, it was essential that the WTA and its partner organizations took significant steps to filter, block and report hateful and harmful comments,” she said .
“No one should have to endure the hate that so many of us have faced through these platforms.”
The figures released Thursday could have been even more depressing, with the ATP, Australian Open and French Open not participating in the Threat Matrix initiative.
In total, 7,739 players from the ITF circuit, the second division of world tennis, and 563 competing WTA tournaments are covered by the detection tool which, according to its initiators, combines “artificial intelligence and human expertise” and operates in “39 languages” .
All players competing in the main draw and qualifying rounds at Wimbledon and the US Open in 2024 were also covered, as were chair umpires at those events.
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