FIFA, the governing body of world football, has issued a report revealing the vast number of social media abuse it has directly reported to the various platforms since the beginning of 2025.
More than 300,000 abusive posts have reported by FIFA, with 11 alleged offenders turned in to local law enforcement in seven countries and one person reported to Interpol.
FIFA said the individuals were in Argentina, Brazil, France, Poland, Spain, the UK and the US, and had been identified following abuse during FIFA competitions, according to BBC Sport.
More than 30,000 posts have been reported by FIFA to social media platforms this year
FIFA set up the SMPS [social media protection service] in 2022 with players union Fifpro to monitor, report and block offensive content.
Specific data regarding the Club World Cup in United States in the summer has been released, with FIFA reviewing millions of relevant posts across the social media landscape.
During the tournament SMPS monitored 2,401 active accounts across five social media platforms covering players, coaches, teams and match officials, revealed a FIFA statement.
5.9 million posts [were] analysed, 179,517 flagged for review and 20,587 reported to the relevant platforms.
In an update at the beginning of the Club World Cup, FIFA stated that it had analysed more than 33 million social media posts since SMPS was launched in 2022.
SMPS works in partnership with the social media platforms to monitor the accounts of the aforementioned players, coaches, teams and officials, working with them to hide, remove and report instances of abuse.
Footballers have routinely been targets for abuse since the dawn of the major social media platforms, with football unfortunately serving as a springboard for millions of horrific messages.
High-profile players have been on the end of a tidal wave of racism, sexism and homophobia that is too often allowed to be dismissed as part of the job or the cost of fame.
FIFA has an imperfect record on matters of social equality and protection but its work with Fifpro in seeking to limit the direct damage of malicious communications is a valuable addition to footballs safeguarding arsenal.
In FourFourTwos opinion, the major social media platforms bear the responsibility for the messages posted on their turf whether or not they consider themselves culpable.
Footballers and figures within the football business should be able to participate in social media, if they wish to do so, without what often seems like the inevitability that any protected characteristics they might possess being specifically targeted by trolls, abusers and bad actors of various stripes.
Given footballs outsized contribution to the coffers of those platforms in the past two decades, the game is entitled to expect better from them when it comes to moderation.
