A new dimension of risks in sports: the cyber domain

Abstract

The digital era and the increasing technological reliance of sport are showing a new face of threat and present a new challenge to the sports organizations – assuring the cybersecurity of the organization, the event, the team. While cybersecurity is a central topic during the design and implementation of the security of major sports events for more than a decade, the sports organizations get newly introduced in the domain, and unfortunately, some happen to learn lessons painfully – by suffering a cyber-attack. The present article aims to examine different kinds of cyber threats to which sports organizations are exposed by studying the most common types of attackers, motivation, and the means used for an attack. The applied methodology includes a literature review and case study performed on cases from three types of categories: major sports events; sports administering bodies, clubs, and athletes. The results of the analysis provide systematic information about the most common attackers’ types, motivations, and approaches which can be used as a foundation for further development of cybersecurity risk assessment of sports organizations.