Tennis players to get protection from online abuse

LONDON — A new monitoring service will help protect tennis players from online abuse and threats, the International Tennis Federation and other governing bodies said Wednesday.

In their joint announcement, the ITF, US Tennis Association, All England Club and WTA Women's Tour said the 'Threat Matrix' service would operate in 35 languages ​​when it launches on January 1.

“Tennis players are subject to significant levels of abuse on social media and other inappropriate contact online, which poses risks to their preparation, performance and mental health,” the statement said. “The Threat Matrix service will help identify attackers, against whom all available measures will be taken.”

Threat Matrix is ​​“a specialist service developed by AI company Signify Group”.

The new service will “monitor players’ public social media channels for abusive and threatening content” across X, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook and TikTok.

“Tennis must be a sport in which players can compete to the best of their abilities, without any form of harassment,” said David Haggerty, president of the International Tennis Federation.

The men's ATP Tour and organizers of the Australian Open and French Open were not part of Wednesday's announcement.