Sports Betting: Risks & Ripple Effects Teach-Out

Kristy Gale and Cody Wang examine how online sportsbooks use data, the questions surrounding athletes’ biometric information, and efforts to protect the integrity of sports wagering.

Takeaways: Athlete and Bettor-Level Data

We have prepared a list of key points from the Athlete and Bettor-Level Data & Sports Wagering Integrity interview for your reference:

1. Athlete data is expansive, sensitive, and increasingly monetizable. Modern athletic programs collect far more than performance statistics. Wearables and athlete management systems aggregate biometric data (heart rate, sleep, and hydration), load and movement data, geolocation, academic indicators, and even personality traits. While this data supports training, injury prevention, recruiting, and contract evaluation, it also raises profound questions about ownership, consent, privacy, and downstream commercial use—especially as betting markets grow more granular and data becomes more valuable.

2. Sportsbook bettor data is narrower than big tech data, but still powerful. Unlike platforms such as Amazon that infer broad lifestyle patterns, sportsbooks primarily collect betting-specific data: deposits and withdrawals, bet types, timing, selected odds, geolocation, and timestamps. Much of this data collection is driven by regulatory compliance, fraud prevention, and dispute resolution. However, when analyzed at scale, these signals can still reveal behavioral risk patterns, inform personalization, and shape how users interact with betting products.

3. Data serves multiple and sometimes competing purposes. Athlete and bettor data is simultaneously used to improve performance, enhance user experience, protect integrity, and drive business outcomes. For bettors, data analytics can flag problematic play and enable responsible gambling interventions, but the same insights can also be used to optimize engagement. For athletes, health data can support wellbeing while also influencing selection, contracts, and public narratives. These overlapping uses make governance, transparency, and accountability essential.

4. Integrity monitoring relies on automation, collaboration, and trust. With millions of bets placed daily, sportsbooks depend on automated analytics as a first line of defense. Machine-driven systems detect unusual betting patterns that may indicate fraud, insider information, or match manipulation, which are then escalated for human review. Effective integrity monitoring requires close collaboration among sportsbooks, leagues, regulators, and law enforcement. These relationships do not exist in offshore or unregulated markets, where consumer and athlete protections are minimal.

5. Ethical frameworks must keep pace with technology and human consequences. Emerging ideas like athlete “biological passports” reflect growing efforts to give athletes greater control over their data, particularly under evolving privacy regimes such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). As Kristy Gale emphasized, data systems affect real people: athletes facing harassment or threats tied to betting outcomes and individuals whose personal data is continuously collected and monetized. Protecting integrity is not only a technical challenge but a moral one, requiring ongoing dialogue, adaptive policies, and a commitment to centering human wellbeing alongside innovation.

Reflection Questions

In your daily life, you may have one or more than one of the following roles. Think about the questions that we have posed here. How can you use the Athlete and Bettor-Level Data & Sports Wagering Integrity interview to respond to these questions?

• Public health professionals:
  • How might the data practices described in this interview inform public health surveillance frameworks for gambling-related harms in Australia?
• Young adult casual bettors:
  • How does unequal access to data shape your expectations, decisions, and risks when engaging with online sportsbooks?
  • How comfortable are you with the amount of personal and behavioral data online platforms collect about you? Do you understand how it might be used?
  • Knowing that sportsbooks track your betting patterns and timing, how does this change how you think about your own gambling habits?
  • What surprised you most about how much data is collected on both athletes and bettors? Does this affect whether you would use a regulated or unregulated platform?
• Athlete:
  • Who controls your performance and health data, and how might it affect your safety, privacy, or future opportunities?
• Athletics departments:
  • What protections and educational supports should institutions put in place as athlete-level data and sports betting become more intertwined?
  • How could you use information about athlete data collection and integrity monitoring to educate your student-athletes about protecting themselves?
• Parent or guardian:
  • What questions might you ask your teens about the data betting apps collect about them? How could this start a conversation about digital privacy?

Additional Resource

1. How Athlete Data Can Help Monitor Sports-Wagering Integrity