FIFA’s annual monitoring publication by its social media protection service (SPMS) on social media abuse in football has reported that this year, it reported eleven(11) individuals to law enforcement authorities and forwarded one case to Interpol.

These individuals were reported for online abuse targeted at players, coaches, referees, and teams during official FIFA competitions.

These individuals FIFA said were in Argentina, Brazil, France, Poland, Spain, the UK and the US, and had been identified “following abuse during Fifa competitions”.

FIFA President Gianni Infantino, in remarks during the celebration of the International Day for Tolerance yesterday, November 16, highlighted his outfit’s commitment to sanitising the sport from cyber, pitch bullying or any other place.

He said, “On the International Day for Tolerance, I want to make it abundantly clear that football must be a safe and inclusive space – on the pitch, in the stands and online. Through the Fifa social media protection service (SMPS) and by deploying advanced technology and human expertise, Fifa is taking decisive action to protect players, coaches, teams, and match officials from the serious harm that online abuse causes.”

The SMPS is a monitoring and safeguarding system created by FIFA in partnership with FIFPRO (the global players’ union) to protect football players, coaches, referees, and teams from online abuse during competitions. It was set up in 2022.

Fifa was criticised after it appeared to drop anti-racism messaging at the Club World Cup, which was held in the US this summer, but SMPS was used.

A Fifa statement read: “During the tournament SMPS monitored 2,401 active accounts across five social media platforms covering players, coaches, teams and match officials participating at the groundbreaking tournament, with 5.9m posts analysed, 179,517 flagged for review and 20,587 reported to the relevant platforms.”

Infantino said: “Our message is clear: abuse has no place in our game, and we will continue to work with our member associations, the confederations and law enforcement authorities to hold offenders accountable.

“This behaviour has no place in football or in society and Fifa is taking all possible steps by reporting these incidents and also by blacklisting individuals from purchasing tickets for Fifa tournaments.”

The international governing body of football mentioned that 65,000 abusive posts have been reported to social media platforms since the SMPS was created adding that it has flagged over 30,000 abusive posts to social media platforms this year.

World football’s governing body said in a report that 11 people were reported to law enforcement authorities in 2025 and one case was submitted to Interpol.

Meanwhile, racism, one of the abuses in football, has evolved, while authorities make efforts to completely nip it in the bud, some fans refuse to budge.

Manchester United forward Marcus Rashford, who is currently on a season-long loan at Barcelona, was racially abused by a fan in the stands on September 25 during the Catalan giants' 3-1 win over Real Oviedo. TV microphones picked that up, and later it was circulated on social media.

In reaction to this, Spanish authorities have recommended a €4,000 ($4,625) fine for the fan who abused the 27-year-old forward.

"La Liga detected the images on social media and filed a complaint with the National Police," the statement said.

"Subsequently, analysis of footage from the stadium's Organisational Control Unit (UCO) cameras allowed for the identification of the alleged perpetrator. The processing of this proposal will be contingent upon the final decisions made in the criminal proceedings."

The authorities are yet to confirm when a final decision will be taken. This is not the first time Rashford has been subjected to racial abuse. His being a target on several occasions at both the club level and national level has made him an ardent advocate.

Rashford has repeatedly spoken out about racist messages and threats he’s received on platforms like Twitter and Instagram. He’s called for stronger action from tech companies to curb hate speech. Rashford has worked with campaigns like Kick It Out and has urged authorities to hold perpetrators accountable.

Meanwhile, in May last year, FIFA announced that it had put forward a five-pillar plan aimed at addressing racist abuse in football.

The global governing body stated that it had engaged in an extensive consultation process with current and former players who are committed to instigating change.

One of the plan's key suggestions involves implementing a standard crossed-hands gesture for players to signal racist incidents during matches.

The first pillar of the proposal intends to make racism a specific offence which is included in all member associations’ disciplinary codes and has its own “specific and severe sanctions, including match forfeits”.

Fifa said it will “pause, suspend and abandon games in cases of racism”.

The crossed-hands gesture will be used by referees to signal an in-game procedure in which matches are paused twice and warnings are given, with the game to then be abandoned in the event of further racism.

In pillar three – ‘criminal charges’ – Fifa called for racism to be recognised as a criminal offence in every country, and said it would push for severe sanctions in the countries where it is already an offence.

Fifa also said it would promote education initiatives with schools and governments to “provide a future free of racism”, while an anti-racism panel made up of former players will be set up to review the progress of the proposal.

In 2023, a FIFA report found almost 20,000 abusive social media posts were aimed at players, coaches and officials during the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

And in 2021, England manager Gareth Southgate called the racist abuse aimed at Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka after the Euro 2020 final “unforgivable”.