Cristiano Ronaldo and Harry Maguire targeted most as report reveals alarming extent of online abuse

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Cristiano Ronaldo and Harry Maguire received the most Twitter abuse of any Premier League footballers last season, with Manchester United stars making up eight of the top ten targeted players according to a new report from Ofcom.

Research by the Alan Turing Institute revealed an alarming extent of online hate was prevalent last season, with almost 70 percent of Premier League players subjected to abuse on Twitter in the first half of last season.

An analysis of 2.3 million tweets sent to top-flight players found almost 60,000 were abusive, with eight per cent of the abuse aimed at a protected characteristic, such as their race or gender.

According to Ofcom data, Ronaldo received the most abuse while tweets containing insulting or demanding language sent towards United captain Maguire saw a spike when he apologised on Twitter following the club’s 2-0 defeat to rivals Manchester City on 7 November.

Last season saw United’s worst performance in Premier League history and Marcus Rashford, Bruno Fernandes, Fred, Jesse Lingard, Paul Pogba and David de Gea were also targeted over the first half of the campaign. England players Harry Kane and Jack Grealish were also named in the top 10 of players who received the greatest number of abusive tweets, according to the report.

The study used new technology that can decipher whether tweets are abusive, while 3,000 random tweets were also manually reviewed. Of those 3,000 tweets, over half were positive, 27 per cent were neutral, 12.5 per cent were critical and 3.5 per cent were abusive.

Twitter was chosen due to its popularity with players, previous history of abuse and because it makes data available for research.

However, the Application Programming Interface (API) does not take into account the safeguards put in place.

Ofcom is preparing to regulate tech companies under new Online Safety laws, which will introduce rules for sites, apps, search engines and messaging platforms aimed at protecting users.

“These findings shed light on a dark side to the beautiful game,” Ofcom group director for broadcasting and online content Kevin Bakhurst said. “Online abuse has no place in sport, nor in wider society, and tackling it requires a team effort.

“Social media firms needn’t wait for new laws to make their sites and apps safer for users. When we become the regulator for online safety, tech companies will have to be really open about the steps they’re taking to protect users. We will expect them to design their services with safety in mind.

“Supporters can also play a positive role in protecting the game they love. Our research shows the vast majority of online fans behave responsibly, and as the new season kicks off we’re asking them to report unacceptable, abusive posts whenever they see them.”

Twitter, which says it did not receive any of the abusive tweets included in the report, is committed to eradicating abuse and recently conducted research using its own technology that found 38,000 abusive tweets were sent last season. It also removed more than 38,000 abusive tweets.

The social media company received fewer than 1,000 reports of abusive tweets from its reporting partner and is now focusing on reducing the burden on the victims by identifying abuse itself using its own technology and third-party safety tools.

Twitter is also engaging in focus groups with football partners to work on ways to reduce abuse.

A Twitter spokesperson told the PA news agency: “We are committed to combating abuse and, as outlined in our Hateful Conduct Policy, we do not tolerate the abuse or harassment of people on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, gender identity or sexual orientation.

“As acknowledged in the report, this type of research is only possible because our public API is open and accessible to all. However, our publicly accessible API does not take into account the range of safeguards we put in place, so this does not completely reflect the user experience.

“We have not been provided with the accounts, tweets or dataset included in this report so we are unable to comment on these specifically.

“Today, more than 50 per cent of violative content is surfaced by our automated systems, further reducing the burden on individuals to report abuse.

“While we have made recent strides in giving people greater control to manage their safety, we know there is still work to be done. This is a company-wide priority as our product, policy and engineering teams continue to work at scale and pace to build a healthier Twitter.”

Additional reporting from PA