The wave of gambling-related harassment toward college athletes have resulted in a new effort by Venmo and the NCAA to foster a safe environment ahead of football season.
On Tuesday, Venmo announced a partnership with the NCAA to protect student-athletes from instances of harassment on the mobile payment service, owned by PayPal. As part of the deal, Venmo will upgrade its consumer protections for student-athletes who face abuse.
“The harassment we are seeing across various online platforms is unacceptable, and we need fans to do better,” said NCAA President Charlie Baker. “We applaud Venmo for taking action, and we need more social media companies and online platforms to do the same.”
The partnership between Venmo and the NCAA will provide student-athletes with a dedicated reporting hotline for notification of potential cases of abuse. The hotline can spearhead investigations into any harassment directed toward student-athletes.
A best practices guide will also be issued by Venmo to colleges and universities across the country through various channels, including e-learning modules and newsletters.
Venmo will also be deploying resources to monitor the accounts of student-athletes on a 24-hour basis to thwart any requests for money tied to player and game performances.
“While unwanted interactions to athletes make up an extremely small percentage of transactions on Venmo, even a small number of these incidents is unacceptable,” said PayPal Head of Global Financial Crime and Customer Protection David Szuchman. “The safety and security of our users remain our highest priority.”
SBC Americas reached out to the NCAA for comment on its partnership with Venmo.
Sports fans requesting money from athletes
Athletes across various levels have recently reported requests by fans for money on various payment platforms, including Venmo.
Earlier this year, PGA Tour golfer Max Homa received a $1,900 request from Venmo for an inability to “putt under pressure” during July’s John Deere Classic. Four-time major champion Scottie Scheffler deleted his Venmo account due to harassment from golf fans.
Ottawa Senators captain Brady Tkachuk locked his public Venmo account this year.
In 2024, the issue was also prevalent in college sports with former Auburn quarterback Payton Thorne saying he had fans contact him on Venmo for their gambling losses.
Venmo tied to an improper betting allegation
Venmo also found itself in the midst of an illicit wagering allegation in college football.
Oklahoma quarterback John Mateer denied any wrongdoing after screenshots of his personal Venmo account were shared online with multiple transactions mentioning “sports gambling.” The two payments were made to a former teammate in November 2022.
NCAA bylaws ban wagering by players, coaches and team officials on all competitions sponsored by the organization. NCAA guidelines stipulate that student-athletes who place bets on their teams or any sport at their school could face loss of eligibility.
The Venmo transactions were made while Mateer was a student-athlete at Washington State, with one transaction mentioning a game between USC and UCLA in its description.
Mateer is entering his first year with Oklahoma football as a redshirt junior. Oklahoma said it is unaware of an NCAA investigation into Mateer’s Venmo transactions.
The university said it has no reason to believe a probe will be initiated.
