A new working group has been established to address online abuse in football.

The ‘Online Hate in Professional Football Working Group’ brings together Ofcom, the UK Football Policing Unit, the Football Association, Premier League, English Football League, Women’s Super League, Professional Footballers’ Association, and Kick It Out to “share insights and intelligence about the online hate and abuse faced by people working in professional football”.

Online abuse is particularly prevalent in the world of football. At the end of last year, the BBC reported that more than 2,000 ‘extremely abusive’ social media posts – including death and rape threats – were sent about managers and players in the Premier League and Women’s Super League over the course of a single weekend.

Various initiatives have sought to address the problem, including the Professional Footballers’ Association’s ‘#Enough’ campaign and the activities of Kick It Out. However, there is a general recognition that the issue is not going away. Indeed, the CEO of Signify, a data science company that monitors online abuse, recently said that it has detected a 25% year-on-year increase in the levels of abuse.

Beyond industry-led initiatives, many have placed hope in the Online Safety Act 2023 as a mechanism to put a halt to online abuse. Last year, for example, the Chair of Sport England wrote to the CEO of Ofcom, Dame Melanie Dawes, asking how the regulator could use its powers to respond to a surge in abuse directed at England’s women’s team during the Euros. This was followed by Ofcom publishing industry guidelines (see here) on measures that tech firms should adopt to address some of the types of abuse faced by female athletes online.

The new working group seeks to go further by bringing together regulators, law enforcement and industry bodies to share intelligence. The aim is not only to support criminal investigations where appropriate, but also to inform Ofcom’s ongoing policy development and enforcement work under the Online Safety Act 2023, including the forthcoming requirements for certain platforms to introduce user empowerment features.

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