Madison Square Garden Database Tracked LGBTQ Status of Celebs

Madison Square Garden kept a database that tracked the race, sexual orientation, and gender identity of some of its prominent attendees, a new report in WIRED revealed.

The “talent” database, which is a list of almost 40,000 celebrities, politicians, and figures in business and technology, was acquired and leaked by the hacking group ShinyHunters on the dark web on June 16.

Nearly 400 of these people were assigned a risk score, ranging from low to high. Some were even categorized with labels saying “DO NOT HOST” or “BANNED FROM MSG.”

Many of the entries assigned risk scores have a history of attending Knicks games, including Tracy Morgan and Ben Stiller, who are both “low risk.” Several of those who are labeled as higher risk have a different history: criticizing MSG and Knicks owner James Dolan.

ShinyHunters leaked the data after announcing that MSG failed to reach an agreement with the group. Alongside the list, ShinyHunters released 26 million other records, including sensitive customer information.

Data including emails, street addresses, and birthdays had been stolen from millions of general attendees of MSG events due to the hack. The leak prompted several class-action lawsuits over MSG’s data collection and security practices.

However, further insights into MSG’s surveillance were revealed on July 9 when it was reported that 93 of the attendees included in the “talent” database were listed with the category “LGBTQIA,” including singers Phoebe Bridgers and Ricky Martin.

“James Dolan has serious questions to answer,” Assemblymember Tony Simone said. “First, why is he so obsessed with us? There is no legitimate reason for Madison Square Garden to be tracking or labeling people based on their sexual orientation or gender identity.”

It is unclear why MSG is tracking the sexual orientation of attendees. However, it is not the first time MSG has been caught singling out LGBTQ attendees of the stadium. In April, another WIRED article alleged that Dolan and his team have used facial-recognition to track people within the stadium for years.

One of these people was a transgender woman, Nina Richards, who Dolan’s team reportedly tracked for a two-year period as she attended Knicks games. Out of concern for privacy, the woman requested a pseudonym—Richards—be used as her last name for the WIRED report.

Dolan’s chief security officer, John Eversole, allegedly was fixated on Richards and showed her picture at weekly security meetings, according to a lawsuit filed by Donald Ingrasselino, MSG’s security vice president. The lawsuit says that Eversole told the security staff to “keep him or it or whatever it is away from the players.”

The report claims that Richards’ face was entered into MSG’s facial recognition system. On one night, the system was used to track her every movement, despite sources saying she posed no threat and was not attempting to enter restricted areas.

The lawsuit claims that Eversole was concerned about the openly transgender woman damaging MSG’s reputation, and that Eversole fabricated “a stalking allegation to justify banning her.”

Former staffers said that Richards was singled out for her gender identity and was “harassed.”

MSG’s facial recognition system has been a controversial feature of the venue for years. After Assembly member Simone criticized the software as “dystopian” in January 2023, he was disinvited from the Rangers Pride Night game, where he was supposed to drop the puck.

Now, years later, Simone is seeking to limit MSG’s surveillance practices with legislation.

“I’ve introduced legislation (A6211/S8004) to outlaw discriminatory biometric data collection that Dolan has used for years to exclude the public from his properties,” Simone said. “Madison Square Garden should immediately end these practices and come clean about how this information was collected and used.”

MSG did not respond to requests for comment.