Signal is ?? ??? ??reportedly becoming popular in the sports world.
While the free iOS and Android app—which enables encrypted texts, phone calls, and video chats between users as well as other security features like disappearing messages—has been a great tool for many journalists and human rights activists, its usage in the sports world is a tad more nefarious.
That's according to a new report from Yahoo! Sports that looks at how Signal, once a favorite app of the Trump White House, has spread throughout the sports world, particularly in collegiate athletics, the NBA, and the NFL.
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The report touches on the fact that Signal allows participants to circumvent NCAA rules by allowing college players to chat with professional agents, and for public schools to "avoid detection from Freedom Of Information Act" requests from journalists. But it's the app's use in pro sports that is most intriguing.
Unsurprisingly, the report notes how Signal is now an incredibly popular app in the NBA, a league where accusations of tampering — players or teams trying to persuade other players to join them while the targets are still under contract with another team — have run rampant for years.
In 2019 alone there have been a few high-profile examples of alleged tampering. LeBron James' alleged wooing of Anthony Davis to the Lakers while Davis was still under contract with the New Orleans Pelicans was enough to earn a stern warning from the NBA. And when news of Kevin Durant's agreement to leave the Golden State Warriors for the Brooklyn Nets broke minutes before impending free agents were even allowed to talk to potential future teams, NBA commissioner Adam Silver could only throw up his hands.
The NBA did, in fact, seemingly strengthen those tampering rules ahead of the beginning of this season. But it has to enforce them, too. Among those new rules are the random auditing of five teams' communications between other teams and player agents, and a rule that states that "top team officials are required to save communications with agents for one year."
The league even sent out a reminder at the end of October that seemed aimed at those using Signal.
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The Yahoo! report adds, "A source with knowledge of the memo told Yahoo Sports the NBA also mandated a new rule: Team personnel may not use apps that auto-delete relevant communication."
Yahoo! goes on to add, though, that Signal wasn't specifically mentioned and that "as long as they don't auto-delete messages, teams are permitted to use apps like Signal."
So, in essence, Signal is still allowed as long as users don't auto-delete their messages, something the league actually has no way of enforcing.
If your response is the same as the famous Confused Nick Young meme, you're not alone.
Via GiphyUnless the NBA figures out a way to reallyenforce its tampering rules, teams and players are going to keep using Signal and similar apps.
As for the NFL, Yahoo's story focuses primarily on how the infamous destroyed cell phone from the New England Patriots' Deflategate scandal has inspired players and execs to start using Signal since it enables users to ensure messages disappear not just from the sender's phone but from the recipient's as well.
Topics Cybersecurity