Football players are issuing “stop processing” requests to gaming, betting and data-processing firms over the use of their performance, health and injury data, citing ethical concerns with how the information being distributed about them can affect their career prospects.
Under Article 21 of the UK’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), individuals have the right to object to the processing of their personal data.
Submitted on behalf of players by the Global Sports Data and Technology Group (GSDT) – an enterprise co-founded by former Cardiff City and Leyton Orient manager Russell Slade, and technologist Jason Dunlop – the “stop processing” requests are asking the companies involved to cease their processing of all tracking and performance data, as well as other personal information such as health or injury information.
The “stop processing” requests sent by GSDT – as part of its Project Red Card initiative to give footballers and other sportspeople more control over the collection and use of their performance data – follow its extensive engagement with companies in the gaming, betting and sports data industries over the past five years.
While GSDT are unable to disclose which companies the requests have been sent to, they are some of the largest betting, gaming and sports data consultancy companies in the world.
Speaking with Computer Weekly, Dunlop and Slade said that they must now take action via Article 21 of the UK GDPR because the ethical concerns GSDT has raised about the use of football players’ data have been ignored by firms throughout the sports data ecosystem.
“We’re still in correspondence with them, but I just don’t think we’re moving forward,” said Dunlop. “It is disappointing that, despite ongoing engagement with these companies for the past five years, we have reached a point where we must take action to protect our players’ and the processing of their data.
“This issue could easily be resolved if players were recognised as stakeholders in the sports data ecosystem. While we have seen some attempts by others to address this, three critical questions remain: Do players have the right to object to industries outside sport using their data? Who should decide who uses a player’s data? And what is the true value of this data to the athlete?”
Slade added the concerns about player data extend to every level of the game: “Many people still don’t understand how this industry works and don’t realise how important accurate data is to a player’s value and career. It is crucial that we get this right for all players.”
Ethical concerns over player data
According to Dunlop, the processing of player information by companies in the gaming, betting and sports data industries takes place without informed consent or financial compensation.
“There is an exemption for commercial processing, but let’s think about the ethics of this,” he said, highlighting that footballers are also people in a workplace trying to do a job. “If you were in work, and every time you went to the toilet, your manager measured the time that you went, left, came back and what you did, you’d probably have some major concerns about that.
“Here we’ve got people in work who are being tracked 25 times a second for everything that they do, and that data is going to all sorts of people who they have no idea about.”
Dunlop added that while most of the data collection is facilitated by clubs themselves for the purposes of player improvement, the information gathered by companies allowed into stadiums is then widely distributed to a range of third parties, which in turn use the data for their own profit without the input or involvement of players themselves.
Slade emphasised that while GSDT has no problem with football clubs using the player data for performance improvement purposes internally, the issue is that it then “goes everywhere”.
Dunlop also highlighted a range of ethical concerns around, for example, the accuracy of player data, which can negatively affect their career prospects if inaccurate information is distributed, and the use of people’s data in the context of gambling if they are personally opposed to it.
Ultimately, Dunlop said GSDT’s goal is to strike a fair balance between players’ rights and the commercial interests of firms that benefit from the data processing.
“The difficulty is, how do you move from where we are to a position where all the stakeholders are comfortable with it?” he said, adding that players also have a right to not make it work and say no to the data processing completely if that’s what they decide.
They told Computer Weekly that, because of the relatively short career spans of footballers, giving them more control over how their data is used can help to support them financially when they hang their boots up.
“There’s a lot of life left after football, and that’s if players are lucky enough to see out a career to the age of 33 or 34,” said Slade, adding this also affects “bread-and-butter” players in lower leagues. “All these bets and this money is being exchanged on the basis of your data, and you aren’t seeing a penny of that.”
Depending on the response of firms to the Article 21 requests, Dunlop and Slade said that next steps would involve approaching the data regulator, before considering legal action. Their hope is that, because football plays such a central role in so many people’s lives, it can set a precedent for people becoming more aware of their data rights and how to exercise them.
“I think this is a really good example where sport can lead the way for general data subjects,” said Dunlop.
