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27 J. Legal Aspects Sport 32 (2017)
Follow Me, What's the Harm: Considerations of Catfishing and Utilizing Fake Online Personas on Social Media

handle is hein.journals/jlas27 and id is 32 raw text is: Journal of Legal Aspects of Sport, 2017, 27, 32-45 https://doi.org/10.1123/Jlas.2016-0020 Human Kinetics ZJ @ 2017 Human Kinetics, Inc. ORIGINAL RESEARCH Follow Me, What's the Harm? Considerations of Catfishing and Utilizing Fake Online Personas on Social Media Lauren Reichart Smith and Kenny D. Smith Indiana University Matthew Blazka Indiana State University This essay centers on the concepts of catfishing and online impersonation. Utiliz- ing the Manti Te'o catfishing hoax and the Texas Tech football coaching staff's admittance of using fake profiles on social media to follow their players as a basis, this piece will examine past instances of athletes and catfishing and the connection between collegiate athletics and catfishing. Past legal incidents that focus specifically on catfishing, as well as specific laws that could have ramifica- tions on catfishing and fake online personas will be discussed. Finally, the legal considerations that may have a potential effect on the various communication elements within social media platforms will be explored. Recommendations for future research will also be presented. Keywords: social media; athletes; catfishing On September 15, 2012, Notre Dame University linebacker Manti Te'o recorded 12 tackles to help lead Notre Dame to an upset win over Michigan State University. What made this particular story so compelling was not the athletic dominance of a collegiate football player, but that his performance came only hours after learning of the deaths of both his grandmother and his girlfriend, who died on the same day. The story of Manti Te'o and Lennay Kekua, his girlfriend, resonated across the nation, both in the world of sports and outside it. The Notre Dame community came together over the death of Kekua, raising over $4,000 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (Chronicle of Philanthropy, 2013). The story of the romance between Te'o and Kekua followed him through his Heisman campaign, where he finished second in the voting, to Notre Dame's first appearance in the BCS national championship game. Te'o was heralded across media outlets after saying the death of Kekua inspired him to play better (ESPN.com, 2013). L.R. Smith and K.D. Smith are with the Media School, Indiana University, Bloomington. M. Blazka is with the Dept. of Kinesiology, Recreation, and Sport, Indiana State University, Terre Haute. Address author correspondence to Lauren Smith at LS35@iu.edu 32

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