Fanatics Sportsbook Unveils Bad Actor Tool to Target Bettor Abuse of Athletes
Posted on: June 26, 2026, 09:13h.
Last updated on: June 26, 2026, 10:47h.
- Fanatics Sportsbook partnered with IC360 and Signify Group to launch the “Bad Actor Program,” a proactive tool designed to track and identify bettors who harass athletes, coaches, and officials online
- The initiative links social media tracking with account management, allowing Fanatics to leverage AI monitoring to suspend or permanently ban abusive users and share evidence with law enforcement
- The rollout targets an escalating industry crisis, responding to NCAA data that revealed sports betting fueled 12% of all flagged abusive social media posts during recent collegiate championship events
Fanatics Sportsbook has teamed up with Integrity Compliance 360 (IC360) and Signify Group to launch a first-of-its-kind ‘Bad Actor Program’ designed to identify and ban bettors who harass athletes and coaches online.
Known as the Bad Actor Program, IC360 will collaborate with Signify Group’s Threat Matrix service to monitor multiple social media platforms for threatening content.
In the event that abuse is detected which targets athletes, organizations and teams on open-source social media, those individuals behind those accounts will be placed into IC360’s ProhiBet Bad Actor platform.
Similar to IC360’s ProhiBet platform, which helps prevent athletes, coaches and trainers from placing prohibited wagers, ProhiBet Bad Actor enables sportsbooks to block betting accounts belonging to individuals who threaten or harass athletes and coaches.
Fanatics First to Jump Aboard
Fanatics Sportsbook is the first legal sports betting member of the Bad Actor program and will launch the new program in time for football season.
“This groundbreaking program will hold bettors accountable for threats made against players, coaches, and officials. It falls in line with our core values at Fanatics – respect and tolerance for the athletes and coaches that play the games that we love,” said Matt King, CEO of Fanatics Betting and Gaming.
We encourage other operators to join the initiative because there is no sports betting potential loss that should embolden a sports betting customer to threaten or harass an athlete online.”
Fanatics Warns Abusive Bettors Face Permanent Bans
As part of Threat Matrix’s monitoring, athletes and coaches are encouraged to report abusive direct messages directly. Once those are submitted, Signify will analyze and assess their severity, and where behavior appears to be criminal, the team will pass evidence packs over to law enforcement.
Fanatics Sportsbook will suspend or permanently terminate a customer’s account if it is determined they engaged in abusive, threatening, defamatory or harassing conduct, including comments in reply threads, reposts and wider fan discourse.
The evidence-based reports and list of names will be shared with other “like-minded legal sports betting operators”, according to a Fanatics statement.
“Threats of violence and harassment in sports at arenas and on social media are increasing at an alarming rate, undermining the integrity of the sports betting industry,” said Scott Sadin, Co-CEO of IC360. “Addressing the individuals with ProhiBet BA and Threat Matrix is crucial to protecting athletes and other stakeholders from serious, long-term harm.”
Athletes and Coaches Increasingly Targeted on Social Media
The initiative comes as gambling-related harassment of athletes and coaches continues to escalate. A landmark NCAA study analyzing social media abuse during the 2024 season verified that sports betting directly fueled 12% of all flagged, abusive posts directed at collegiate sports figures.
That hostile environment mirrors a growing crisis at the professional level. In May 2025, Houston Astros pitcher Lance McCullers Jr. was targeted with online death threats against his family by a frustrated, inebriated bettor located overseas, forcing team owner Jim Crane to hire 24-hour private security for the player’s home.
According to reporting from ESPN, Milwaukee Brewers outfielder Christian Yelich noted that dealing with gambling-related online vitriol has simply become a nightly routine for most major leaguers.
Coaches are bearing the brunt of the backlash as well. In 2024, Cleveland Cavaliers head coach J.B. Bickerstaff—who has since taken over the Detroit Pistons—revealed to reporters that disgruntled sports bettors had acquired his personal telephone number, bombarding him with threatening messages targeting his children and exposing details about where his family lived.
Kiner-Falefa Threatened
The vitriol hit agonizingly close to home for Canadian fans last November. Moments after the Toronto Blue Jays dropped a heartbreaking Game 7 of the World Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers, Jays utilityman Isiah Kiner-Falefa sat in a stunned clubhouse scrolling through a barrage of hateful messages—including explicit threats to break his legs.
The infielder had been at the center of a heavily scrutinized, pivotal force-out at home plate in the ninth inning that ultimately turned the game, and the championship, in the Dodgers’ favor.
The toxic fallout sparked immediate speculation that the vitriol was coming from a place of financial loss rather than pure team fandom.
“Sounds like some people lost money on last night’s game. Fans? Likely not. Degenerate gamblers? High possibility. It’s so crazy professional sports allow gambling advertisements, and it’s become so [commonplace],” noted one observer on Threads.
Another user echoed the sentiment, writing that “sports betting has ruined fandom” by causing people to gamble money they cannot afford to lose.
Last Comment ( 1 )
Meanwhile anyone who shows any handicapping skill will be limited to $5 max bets on Fanatics.