Online abuse has long been treated as an occupational hazard of elite sport, particularly football: ugly and difficult but ultimately incidental to performance. However, the UK’s regulator Ofcom has begun to take pre-emptive action, not against the keyboard warriors but the platforms that facilitate and enable abuse.
Ahead of the 2026 Men’s FIFA World Cup, Ofcom issued a pointed warning: those working in sport must be protected from online abuse by the platforms that enable it. As Oliver Griffiths, Ofcom’s group director of online safety, observed: 'Tech firms now have a legal duty to deal with illegal hate and abuse… we’ll be holding them to account if they don’t.'
Ofcom’s intervention signals a wider shift in how online abuse in elite sport should be understood: not simply as a welfare or reputational matter to be weathered by individuals in the line of fire, but in appropriate cases as criminal conduct.
Issued in anticipation of escalating online hostility during the World Cup, the guidance reflects the increasingly robust expectations placed upon platforms under the Online Safety Act 2023. Technology companies are now required to identify and mitigate risks arising from illegal content on their services, including harassment, threatening communications and hate offences. Platforms must operate systems capable of removing illegal material, responding effectively to reports and reducing foreseeable harms.
The response to online abuse directed at athletes has often been framed primarily through the language of psychological resilience, wellbeing and safeguarding. Clubs have developed welfare systems and governing bodies have introduced reporting mechanisms. Communications teams increasingly monitor reputational threats, and where abuse is committed in person, match stoppages are now more common under FIFA, UEFA and FA spectator abuse protocols. Where an offender in the stands is identified, there is a clear pathway to removal, investigation and prosecution.
Yet the legal dimensions of online abuse have proved harder to articulate and enforce. Ofcom’s intervention suggests that distinction is becoming harder to maintain.
The concern behind Ofcom’s actions is not hypothetical. Following England’s defeat in the UEFA Euro 2020 final, Bukayo Saka, Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho were subjected to sustained online racist abuse and threats after missing penalties in the shootout, prompting police investigations and renewed scrutiny of platform moderation.
The episode demonstrated how quickly online hostility towards elite athletes can escalate into criminal conduct. Although public and parliamentary condemnation followed swifty, accountability proved more challenging.
When abuse becomes criminal
Repeated online communications directed at a player (or any individual) may constitute harassment under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997. A 'course of conduct' causing alarm or distress can arise quickly where communications are persistent, targeted and intimidating, but the distinction between unpleasant commentary and criminal harassment is frequently misunderstood. One hostile message following a poor performance is unlikely to justify criminal intervention, whereas hundreds of messages over several days, coordinated targeting, references to family members and attempts to evade blocking might. More serious conduct may engage stalking offences, particularly where behaviour suggests fixation or attempts to monitor an athlete’s movements, family life or private addresses.
Since reforms introduced through the Online Safety Act, the legal framework governing online communications has evolved. Threats of rape, violence or serious harm and racist abuse directed at athletes or the dissemination of false information about them or their associates are not simply examples of 'online trolling'; they may amount to serious criminal offences.
Section 181 operates to criminalise anyone sending a message that 'conveys a threat of death or serious harm' where the intention was for an individual encountering that message to fear that the threat would be carried out, or was reckless as to whether an individual encountering the message would have the same fear. 'Serious harm' means an injury amounting to grievous bodily harm, rape, assault by penetration or serious financial loss. An individual found guilty of this offence can face up to five years’ imprisonment.
Section 178 criminalises the sending of false information. To be guilty of this offence – which carries a maximum sentence of 51 weeks’ imprisonment – a person must have intended the message or information to cause 'non-trivial psychological or physical harm to a likely audience.'
None of this suggests that criminal law should be deployed indiscriminately. Freedom of expression remains fundamental, and public figures, including athletes, must tolerate robust criticism, hostility and commentary that they may perceive as unfair or unpleasant. However, regarding online abuse as simply 'part of the game' risks obscuring the moment when conduct crosses identifiable criminal thresholds.
The greatest challenge is often recognising and enforcing criminal conduct. Online abuse frequently sits within organisational silos, and clubs may hesitate to escalate matters for fear of additional publicity, considering (accurately) that they are better placed than the criminal justice system to protect their player.
By the time specialist legal advice is obtained, opportunities to preserve evidence or assess escalation risk may have narrowed. Digital abuse rarely exists in isolation; patterns emerge over time, requiring contemporaneous analysis. Anonymous accounts, deleted material and jurisdictional complications (with many offenders operating from overseas) are common obstacles.
Yet investigations also fail for avoidable reasons. Evidence preservation is often poor in the early stages: victims frequently block the offending accounts, so that messages disappear with evidential consequences. In some cases, a third party can take over the accounts and gather relevant evidence.
Ofcom’s intervention reframes the expectations of platforms, with social media companies increasingly under legal obligations to address illegal content, not merely encouraged to behave responsibly.
It also reinforces the distinction between harmful content and unlawful conduct. The Online Safety Act does not criminalise unpleasant behaviour simply because it is offensive, but requires platforms to address content already recognised as illegal, including threats, harassment and hate-related offending.
Furthermore, it encourages the sports industry to reassess whether it is sufficiently prepared for the negative consequences of an event like the World Cup. Most elite sporting environments are highly sophisticated in responding to physical safety, safeguarding and reputational crisis. Understanding criminal offences and processes may need to be added to that protection matrix.
Danielle Reece-Greenhalgh is partner at Corker Binning
No comments yet