Fantasy sports websites DraftKings and FanDuel said in a joint statement Tuesday that their employees are no longer permitted to participate in online sports contests for money in the wake of a recent data leak.
“The inadvertent release of non-public data by a fantasy operator employee has sparked a conversation among fantasy sports players about the extent to which industry employees should be able to participate in fantasy sports contests on competitor sites,” the statement said.
“We’ve heard from users that they would appreciate more clarity about the rules for this issue. In the interim, while the industry works to develop and release a more detailed policy, DraftKings and FanDuel have decided to prohibit employees from participating in online fantasy sports contests for money.”
Tuesday’s announcement came only a day after both sites, two of the most popular portals within the multibillion dollar daily fantasy-sports industry, faced a backlash brought by reports concerning Ethan Haskell, a DraftKings employee who had dumped data from an internal contest to demonstrate how it could be used beneficially in other online leagues.
The New York Times reported Monday that Mr. Haskell had won $350,000 participating in a contest hosted by FanDuel the same week he posted DraftKings data on the Web.
“It is absolutely akin to insider trading,” Daniel Wallach, a sports and gambling lawyer at Becker & Poliakoff in Florida, told the newspaper. “It gives that person a distinct edge in a contest.”
“We operate based on the trust of our players,” FanDuel spokesman Justine Sacco told ESPN in the wake of the report. “This is not a new issue for us as a company or an industry, and maintaining the integrity of our contests and games is paramount to sustaining and growing our business.”
On Tuesday, the two sites said they were unaware of any evidence that suggested employees of either company had violated rules that were already in place restricting employees from accessing and using competitive data for play on other sites.
According to the sites, employees who may have access to sensitive user data “are rigorously monitored by internal fraud control teams.”
The latest scandal has emerged less than a month after Rep. Frank Pallone, New Jersey Democrat, asked the House Energy Commerce Committee to “hold a hearing examining the relationship between professional sports and fantasy sports to review the legal status of fantasy sports and sports betting.”
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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