Kalshi Partners With Signify to Police Athlete Harassment, Codifies Anti-Abuse Rule
Kalshi announced a partnership with Signify Group on October 15 to monitor social media for abuse and threats directed at athletes, coaches, and sports personnel across the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, and ATP Tour. Kalshi notified the CFTC of a new rule, dated October 13, that codifies athlete harassment as an 'impermissible activity' on its platform, with sanctions up to financial penalties and permanent account closure. The move follows a September appeal by five major leagues and their players' unions for lifetime bans on abusive bettors, and positions Kalshi ahead of the integrity concerns that sports leagues and regulators have raised about prediction market sports contracts.
Kalshi announced a partnership with Signify Group on October 15, 2026 to address online abuse of athletes connected to its sports event contracts. Signify's Threat Matrix system will monitor public social media for abuse, threats, and harassment targeting athletes, coaches, and sports personnel across the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, and ATP Tour. Kalshi users identified as responsible for abusive or threatening behavior may face enforcement action up to and including permanent account closure, and evidence may be referred to sports organizations or law enforcement. Kalshi separately notified the CFTC of a new rulebook provision, dated October 13, that codifies athlete harassment as an 'impermissible activity' on the platform, with user sanctions that could include financial penalties. The partnership operates through the Bad Actor Program established by Signify and Integrity Compliance 360 (IC360), the integrity-monitoring firm already used across sports betting.
The initiative directly addresses one of the specific integrity concerns that sports leagues and regulators have raised about prediction market sports contracts. When individuals have money riding on the performance of a specific athlete, the incentive to abuse or threaten that athlete over a poor performance intensifies — a problem already well-documented in the licensed sports betting industry, where athletes routinely receive abuse from bettors who lost money on their games. The September appeal by five major professional leagues and their players' unions calling for lifetime bans on abusive bettors made athlete harassment a front-line issue, and both licensed sportsbooks and prediction markets are now under pressure to demonstrate they can police it. Fanatics Sportsbook announced a similar Signify partnership in June, and BetMGM introduced comparable protections in February. Kalshi's move brings the prediction market sector into line with the responsible-operator practices that the licensed betting industry has begun to adopt.
The timing and framing of Kalshi's announcement serve a strategic purpose beyond the substantive integrity benefit. Kalshi is defending its sports event contracts against state enforcement and NFL opposition precisely on the ground that it operates as a responsible, federally-regulated exchange rather than as an unregulated gambling operation. Voluntarily adopting athlete-protection measures that match or exceed what licensed sportsbooks do is a way for Kalshi to demonstrate that it takes the integrity responsibilities of a sports-wagering-adjacent business seriously, even as it argues legally that its products are not sports wagering. The anti-harassment rule filed with the CFTC on October 13 is notable in this respect: by codifying the measure in its CFTC rulebook rather than merely adopting an internal policy, Kalshi frames athlete protection as part of its regulated-exchange compliance framework, reinforcing the argument that the CFTC regulatory structure is capable of addressing the integrity concerns that states cite as reasons for gambling regulation.
The limits of the initiative are also worth noting. One analyst observed that protecting athletes from abuse does not stop the abuse from occurring — monitoring and sanctioning abusive users after the fact addresses the symptom rather than the underlying dynamic that financial stakes on individual athletes create. The deeper concern that the NFL and others have raised is not only harassment but manipulation: contracts tied to individual player performance, injuries, and officiating create incentives for insiders to trade on non-public information and, in extreme cases, to attempt to influence outcomes. The Signify partnership addresses harassment but not manipulation, which remains the more serious integrity risk and the one Kalshi has a stronger commercial incentive to downplay. Still, the athlete-harassment measures are a concrete, verifiable step, and they position Kalshi favorably relative to the criticism that prediction market platforms are indifferent to the real-world consequences of the markets they create. As the sector institutionalizes and seeks mainstream acceptance, these responsible-operator measures are likely to become standard, both for their genuine protective value and for their role in the platforms' argument that they can be trusted to self-regulate within the CFTC framework.
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Recent updates
Google Adds Prediction Market Ad Policy — CFTC License Required, Ads Blocked in Five States
Google published a dedicated prediction markets section in its advertising policy on October 15, requiring domestic prediction market operators to hold a CFTC Designated Contract Market license to run ads — a requirement that favors Kalshi and Polymarket US over unlicensed rivals. Google also bars prediction market ads targeting five states where enforcement is most active: Connecticut (added recently), Michigan and New York (July), Ohio (June), and Nevada (earlier in the year). The policy makes Google's advertising platform mirror the state-by-state enforcement map, using commercial access as a de facto regulatory layer.
CFTC Moves to Classify Event Contracts as Swaps — Attempting to Settle the Core SCOTUS Question by Rule
The CFTC, led by Chairman Michael Selig, moved on October 9 to explicitly classify event contracts as swaps under the Commodity Exchange Act, which would place prediction market contracts squarely under federal swap regulation. The scope covers sports, political, cultural, and weather contracts, while a separate provision excludes casino-style gambling and sportsbook wagers. Selig said the aim is to remove 'any ambiguity' about these contracts. The action targets the exact question dividing the federal circuits and now before the Supreme Court — whether event contracts are 'swaps' — and represents an attempt by the federal regulator to settle that question by rule while the courts remain split.
Seminole Tribe Sues DraftKings as 145 Tribal Governments Urge SCOTUS to Act — But Tribes Are Split
The Seminole Tribe of Florida sued DraftKings on October 8 in Broward County court, alleging that DraftKings' Pick6 and sports event contracts operate as unlicensed sportsbooks that violate the Tribe's exclusive sports betting rights under its 2021 Florida gaming compact. The same week, a coalition of roughly 130 federally recognized tribes and 15 tribal organizations filed a Supreme Court amicus brief urging the Court to hear the Kalshi case, arguing the contracts are sports bets and that platforms have operated on Indian lands without tribal authorization under IGRA. But the tribal community is split: several California tribes and an Oklahoma tribe have instead partnered with Kalshi to build apps and online casinos on its platform.