At Roland Garros,
“You’re a scandal for tennis and women’s sport”, “big dog of your deaths, you’re shitty”… Whether they win or lose, it’s always the same refrain. Since social networks have existed, and even more so with the industrial development of online betting sites, tennis players have become accustomed to receiving shovelfuls of insulting messages and death threats after each of their match. Hate in its simplest form, freshly delivered on their Twitter, Facebook or Instagram accounts and mostly emanating from courageous anonymous people on the web.
After numerous warning signals sent by athletes in recent years,Alize Cornet to Chloé Burel via Benoit Pair or Benjamin Bonzi, the authorities of French tennis have decided to act this year at Roland-Garros. How ? By working in collaboration with a French start-up called “Bodyguard”, “Garde du corps” in the language of Kylian Mbappé, whose goal is to carry out a permanent watch on the social networks of the actors throughout the fortnight and to automatically delete all offensive, racist, sexist messages and death threats they receive.
Gaël Monfils, racism and the war in Ukraine
Going to meet the Bodyguard sports manager, at the bend of a corridor in the very private space reserved for players, under the Philippe-Chatrier court, we come across Gaël Monfils by chance. While waiting for his taxi to arrive to take him back to the hotel, the French player, who entered the competition on Tuesday evening against Sebastian Baez, came to find out how the service works. From what we understand, it’s quite simple, interested players only have to flash a QR code, download an application and tick the social networks they wish to see protected, all while giving their consent for Bodyguard takes control of it. “‘Dirty niggas’, I get a lot of them yeah,” says Monf to Yann Guérin, the former PSG com manager who has since moved to Bodyguard. We take the opportunity to ask him what he thinks of the initiative, even if we already know the answer.
It’s cool that there is a company that created this since we are confronted every day with negative comments which come mainly from bettors I think, they are a little frustrated, angry, and they throw horrors, details- he. If we dive into it, we go crazy, I haven’t done it for a while and I have a community manager who takes care of it. I ask him from time to time to read me the funniest comments, because there are some, it’s crazy, they show a real crazy imagination and they write you super beautiful texts, the problem it’s that it’s super beautiful racist texts as possible (laughs)! It’s crazy to waste so much time pouring out so much hate…”
Monfils takes advantage of this meeting with the Bodyguard team to discuss the number of languages that the application can monitor. His problem, insults and death threats in the Russian language. In a relationship with the Ukrainian player Elina Svitolina, in the persistent context of the war in Ukraine, the Frenchman is overwhelmed by attacks from bots or anonymous people from Russia. “Before each of his matches, after each of his matches, it’s hell,” he explains. My CM tries to remove what he can but it’s complicated, he doesn’t only have good days! Yann Guérin reassures him that Russian is indeed one of the languages analyzed by artificial intelligence, including French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and German. Eventually, the AI should be able to read more than 40 different languages.
An initiative that is making its mark at Roland
Created by “a little computer genius in 2017 to fight against a problem of society in the broad sense, online cyberbullying”, according to Guérin, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is trained by linguists to detect the slightest problematic message . “The technology will intercept messages sent to players and analyze them in less than 100 milliseconds to detect toxicity. She will then analyze the general meaning of the comment, to whom it is directed, etc., he explains. Because it’s not at all the same thing to write ” I’m dumb ” or ” you’re dumb ”, it doesn’t make sense to everyone. It will also analyze the overall context of the message. Let’s take the example of the word ‘skin’, a perfectly commonplace word in all languages but which in French becomes problematic in the expression ‘I’m going to make your skin’, since it’s a death threat. »
The task is not simple, the number 1 risk being to fall into censorship. “We do not moderate criticism, which is legitimate and legal, we moderate the way it is expressed, specifies Yann Guérin. The idea is to advocate freedom of expression. Freedom of expression in both directions, that of the general public and that of the players. “Today personalities censor themselves because they fear the reactions of the general public on social networks. Whereas when you can express yourself in a healthy space, you feel freer to say what you want,” he continues. And obviously, the initiative seems to have had its little success since the start of the French Open, with several dozen players having already downloaded the application.
“We have been talking for a long time now about the harmful side of social networks. It’s good to talk about it but it’s also good to do something and find solutions to it. I think it’s a good idea on the part of the FFT. This is the first initiative of this kind that has been put in place so we will see what happens. But in any case, I think it’s good to try to do new things,” applauds Caroline Garcia. “It does not remove the insults that players may receive via private messaging from their Twitter, Insta or Facebook accounts, or even by SMS because that can also happen, but it moderates all public comments, which is already a very good thing. This means that on your social networks, there will be no more atrocities visible to everyone live, ”engages Enzo Py, coach of Lucas Pouille.
Protection during the fortnight, and after?
For Justine Henin, the godmother of the “Team Jeunes BNP Paribas” crossed Sunday on the terrace of Chatrier, it was urgent to act. “Today is much more violent than in my time, admits the former Belgian champion. Before, it was an article in the press that was unpleasant, criticisms that could hurt us, but we had the choice to read or not to read. Today, it is much more intrusive and much more violent. In training projects, we, trainers, must also take this into account when accompanying young people towards professionalism. We have to manage to protect them as much as possible from all that is polluting, and this kind of application is the beginning of an answer. »
Caroline Flaissier, director of the FFT: “The mental health of players is a priority issue for us. We are therefore very proud to be the first Grand Slam tournament to offer players a solution to effectively protect themselves against cyberbullying in order to allow them to play the tournament in the best mental conditions. »
Before heading off to take his taxi, Gaël Monfils has one last question for the Bodyguard employees: “Does it only work for the tournament or is it permanent? “. For the moment, the initiative will only be valid for the fortnight. “The idea could be, depending on the feedback we get, and they are positive for the moment, to put this protection on a permanent basis, that’s what we already do with footballers, rugby players or basketball players. “, reassures Yann Guérin. Like online hate, Bodyguard has a bright future ahead of it.