STATS Perform Data Outage Still Causing Disruptions For DFS Sites

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Chris Altruda was a sportswriter with ESPN, The Associated Press, and STATS for more than two decades before joining Better Collective in 2019. When not crunching iGaming and casino revenue figures, he is usually listening to Iron Maiden or exploring Chicago neighborhoods. His Twitter handle is @AlTruda73 and can be reached via email at [email protected]

DFS STATS Perform Outage
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Though smaller in size and scope compared to troubles earlier this month, the data outage that has roiled STATS Perform and extended into a second week again caused problems for daily fantasy sports players and operators over the weekend.

STATS Perform has not responded to multiple requests for comment from US Bets, nor offered any public statement since the data outage was first noticed. It also has not provided any potential timetable for returning to full operations.

Without directly identifying STATS Perform, DFS operator FanTrax tweeted Sunday night that its data provider endured a cyberattack Oct. 10 and was in the process of onboarding Sportradar as its new provider. A second Twitter user, who is a horse racing analyst for Equibase, also claimed STATS Perform had been the victim of a cyberattack.

Stats Perform’s Twitter account has made one post since the initial outage Oct. 10, promoting an upcoming webinar for its “AI in Sport Series” last Friday.

FanDuel again deals with issues, but smaller in scope

FanDuel, which was hit hardest by the outage the previous weekend and needed until Tuesday to finalize and pay out contests across NFL, MLB, NASCAR, and college football, provided an alert through its customer service Twitter account Friday that live scoring for college football may be “slightly delayed.” It warned of potential delays Sunday for its NFL slate and again for the two games to be played Monday night.

A tweet at 4:33 p.m. EDT Sunday alerted followers to scoring delays in the Ravens-Eagles and Lions-Jaguars games, but most of FanDuel’s issues appeared confined to those two contests but did result in delays to payouts. As was the case the previous weekend, contestants expressed frustration with the delays in various forms — some pointed out potential issues with other games, some threatened to migrate to other operators, and some were upset with similar occurrences taking place for a second consecutive weekend.

Yahoo! Sports released a similar statement on its website Friday, alerting players “the outage could impact updated scores; real-time stats; season-long and career stats; complete rosters; and schedules” for college football, golf, tennis, NASCAR, Formula One, and IndyCar.

Some other smaller operators followed Fantrax’s path to find a new data provider. Reality Sports Online detailed Sunday in a weekly newsletter that it was also onboarding Sportradar as its provider while explaining to customers what took place the previous weekend. Other operators that had no disruption issues tried to lure disgruntled DFS players to their sites during the week.

Contrasting ways of publicly acknowledging outages

Though they are two different organizations loosely linked via sports betting and sports data, the paths taken by STATS Perform and offshore sportsbook BetOnline in addressing their respective outages are stark contrasts. Unlike STATS Perform’s silence regarding its data outage, BetOnline publicly acknowledged it was the victim of a cyberattack approximately 10 hours after its initial tweet early Friday morning alerting followers it knew of website difficulties.

It subsequently spent the weekend addressing the issues while keeping followers apprised, which also included confirming users’ balances and funds were fully protected and pending bets were still considered valid. By Sunday afternoon, BetOnline tweeted it had resumed live activities while also creating a Twitter thread to address any ongoing issues for users.

Author’s Note: Chris Altruda was previously employed at STATS from 2005-16 as an editor and in an editorial freelance capacity until earlier this month.

Photo by Eric Hartline/USA TODAY Sports

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