Porn Forces Sports Authority to Abruptly End Online Training by Pullela Gopichand for Top Coaches

Porn images made its way to an online coaching class for budding badminton coaches on Thursday and became an embarrassment for Sports Authority of India and top officials of Badminton Association of India.

The live streaming session, where India's chief coach Pullela Gopichand and Indonesian coaches Agus Dwi Santoso and Namrih Suroto were teaching a few tricks and lessons to young coaches, left everyone red faced as 700-plus coaches across the country watched the images on their screens at 12.40 pm, Times of India reported.

This live session was part of a 21-day programme being conducted by SAI and BAI.

SAI released a statement on Thursday clarifying that the session on video conferencing app 'Zoom' was not hacked. Zoom has recently come under scrutiny for its lax security features.

"The Sports Authority of India, in association with national sporting federations, is hosting online knowledge development workshop for coaches in 16 disciplines. So far all sessions have functioned smoothly, with 500-700 coaches from across the country participating in the workshops per session," SAI, Bengaluru's statement read.

"In one such online workshop which was being held for badminton coaches on Thursday afternoon, there was a sudden technical malfunction leading to some unwanted material popping up on the screen. The session was being conducted by a senior coach of the Badminton Association of India, who also had the online technical control of the session.

"SAI's IT department is investigating the issue in detail. However it is clear that the Zoom session was not hacked," the statement further said.

CONCERNS ALL AROUND

TOI reported that Gopichand logged out immediately after the glitch happened but one of the participants of the session said the glitch "happened a number of times".

"Santoso, the new Indonesian coach, was the resource person when pictures started appearing on the screen. There was a momentary gap and then the images resurfaced. This happened a number of times," a participant said.

Another coach revealed that there were a number of women participants in the session as well. "When you are conducting a programme on such a large scale you should take precautions. There were several women coaches, parents and some children in the programme, though it is meant only for coaches," he told TOI.

Another coach opined that BAI and SAI should have stopped using Zoom already - "We should have heeded the home ministry's advice. There are so many other platforms. What if something similar happens during online classes by schools?"