In our last article we pointed out that P10 had not set top 10 standards for all age groups. We thought this a strange omission as youngsters do use them to measure performance improvements. You would have thought this matter would have been addressed urgently. But no, the latest initiative involves new procedures for logging on to get some additional rankings data. Although the log in facility was announced at the beginning of April nothing has happened until now. So how does it work and what do we think of it?

First of all there is now no public access to some indoor, under 23 and veteran rankings lists. If you want to see them in future you will have to register and  logon giving personal information.

If you examine the login page the first obvious problem is that this is not a secure page. Information sent to and from this webpage is ‘in the clear’. It is not secure and the information supplied could be misused if it got into the wrong hands. It should be realised that a great percentage of viewers of power of 10 are young athletes but there is nothing on the registration page to suggest that it may be inappropriate for people under 16 to provide the details required.

The next concern is that it is mandatory to provide address and telephone no. If the site owners/sponsors wish to contact an athlete then only email is necessary. Indeed the Registration page breaks Data Protection Legislation as there is no “opt Out” choice regarding contact details. One has to ask the question who wants this information? There is no information on the page about what it will be used for and the privacy policy link on the bottom of every page on the site still does not work.

We note that a feature of registering is that “a member”, irrespective of age, can submit a photo of him/herself. We ask if this is appropriate for youngsters under 16 years of age? Indeed where does this sit with UKA’s own child protection officer? There could potentially be a file containing very sensitive information for thousands of children under the age of 16. Have all the people at UKA/Athletics Weekly/ Athletics Data been CRB checked? With this volume of sensitive information it may be appropriate that the type of vetting for all staff involved in this project should be at the level required for teachers.

And of course this is a first step. Where will it end? It is entirely probable that in future you may have to register to see some rankings, or even register to see any, or all, of the rankings. And eventually you may have to PAY to see any rankings. The path may well have been set.

ABAC Comment. When UKA changed operator for the P10 Rankings we had misgivings. Now we see this site is following the steps of another web based initiative from UKA – The virtual club site for road runners. The intentions are clear. UKA wish to gain access to and control all active athletes in the UK for commercial purposes. We suggest their ultimate aim is to find new income streams for when the money runs out. And the money will run out. Tax payers have rumbled the politicians and will soon rumble the far more expensive and unaccountable quangoes of which our NGB is a prime example. No wonder more and more clubs are joining the independent body ARC.

Lets hope the free topsinathletics rankings site, (which remains faster and more accurate than McCain P10), soon finds a sponsor to allow track and field athletes to continue to freely access rankings without the increasing big brother constraints being imposed by UKA.