Scottish Swimming apologises after ‘Zoom-bomb’ subjects participants to ‘disturbing content’

Scottish Swimming has apologised after an online training session with its elite athletes was hijacked by a ‘zoom-bomber’, who subjected around 300 participants to ‘disturbing content’.

The workout was set up to give the public the chance to remotely exercise via the video app alongside athletes.

However, a user interrupted the call and was able to display explicit content to those taking part.

Commonwealth champion Duncan Scott was among those involved in the call and expressed his “disgust” on social media. Scottish Swimming have reported the incident to the police.

“Scottish Swimming sincerely apologises for the incident that happened this morning during an organised Zoom event, where the aquatics community were invited to work out alongside our performance athletes,” Scottish Swimming said in a statement.

“At the end of last week we shared information about the workout across social media platforms, asking those interested in participating to log into a link that was shared publicly this morning.

“Unfortunately the link was ‘zoom-bombed’ with disturbing content shared with circa 300 people that had signed in to the event. The video was immediately shut down and the incident referred to the police and their cyber-crime unit.”

Scottish Swimming said it would continue to engage with its aquatic community during the lockdown due to the new coronavirus pandemic and ensure there is no repeat of Tuesday’s incident.

“At a time when the aquatics community was pulling together and supporting one another so positively, it’s upsetting to have a minority cause upset and distress during the lockdown,” the governing body added.

Zoom, a video conferencing application, has surged in popularity during the coronavirus lockdown, but has faced a backlash from some users who have criticised its lack of end-to-end encryption and the trend of ‘zoom-bombing’, which sees uninvited users attempt to gain entry to private calls.