Madison Square Garden Sues Wired for Defamation

Photo Credit: Andrew Nyr / CC by 4.0

Madison Square Garden is filing a defamation suit against Wired for alleged defamation over the outlet’s coverage of the leaked MSG celebrity database.

Madison Square Garden Entertainment is suing Advance Magazine Publishers, the publisher of Wired, over the outlet’s coverage of a leaked MSG database containing the names of various celebrities who identify as LGBTQIA.

While Wired was not the first outlet to break news of the database (that would be 404 Media)—and the database contains more than just LGBTQIA celebrities—MSG takes issue specifically with Wired’s coverage. According to MSG, Wired’s “sensational headline” was designed to create a “false implication” about “LGBTQIA surveillance, risk, and discrimination.”

In addition to Wired’s publisher, co-defendants include the reporter and contributing editor who wrote the MSG story, as well as the company’s global editorial director. MSG is seeking a jury trial and compensatory, presumed, and punitive damages, as well as a retraction and correction.

“This case is about defendants’ decision to transform inclusion into exclusion. Defendants’ article and its promotion falsely implied that MSG maintains sexual orientation information to identify, track, rank, exclude, or discriminate against LGBTQIA celebrities, artists, guests, fans, and patrons, because of their sexual orientation or gender identity when the opposite is true,” reads the filing.

“Wired combed the dark web, obtained data stolen from MSG by an extortionist hacking group, and cherry-picked fragments of that data to manufacture a false narrative portraying MSG as targeting the LGBTQIA community for discriminatory purposes,” the filing continues. “Nothing could be further from the truth—MSG is a fervent supporter of the LGBTQIA community.”

The article described a database of nearly 40,000 records that included “risk” scores for hundreds of people and sexual orientation fields for some entries. The database was stolen from MSG’s Salesforce, a standard customer relationship management platform, by hacker group ShinyHunters, who had attempted to extort the company before publishing the material online.

MSG claims that Wired isolated only the LGBTQIA entries—approximately 93 out of around 40,000 records—to create the appearance of a discriminatory list. MSG asserts that the orientation field was created in August 2022 for inclusion purposes, including Pride event invitations and charitable outreach, and that access was restricted to just a handful of employees.

Notably, MSG points out that only 4% of the LGBTQIA-tagged records contained an entry with a “risk level,” compared to 9% of records tagged “Heterosexual.”

“We stand by this reporting, and we plan to vigorously defend it against this baseless and ridiculous lawsuit,” reads a statement from Wired. “We look forward to continuing our coverage of MSG, and on billionaire James Dolan’s use of technology across his entertainment empire. It’s one part of our wider mission and the critical job of journalists, now more than ever: holding power to account.”