Twelve new cameras now inside Utah State University’s basketball arena have a very specific aim: To capture live game data that will be sold directly to sportsbooks.

It’s part of a new initiative under the realigned Pac-12, which USU joined this year. In the spring, the athletic conference announced its partnership with Genius Sports, a sports tech company, and billed the cameras as powering “the next generation of authorized and responsible sports betting.”

Under the agreement, Pac-12 leadership has ordered that Genius Sports’ video equipment be installed in every school venue for football, men’s and women’s basketball.

USU confirmed in a statement to The Salt Lake Tribune that its information technology department has been installing the camera system in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum basketball arena and anticipates the venue “being fully functional in the next few weeks.” The cameras are expected to come next to USU’s Maverik Stadium.

But the equipment raises a unique legal question for the only school in the conference in Utah, where any form of gambling is strictly against the law: Does having the cameras at USU, effectively enabling gambling on Utah games and players, violate the law?

It comes as state leaders have recently ramped up their efforts to squash online sports betting here through popular apps. Just last week, Utah’s attorney general announced the state was filing suit against Kalshi, one of the leading companies in the sports prediction market.

When reached by The Tribune for this story, though, the Utah attorney general’s office, which represents Utah’s public colleges and universities, said it had “no comment” on the cameras at USU.

Requests for comments to both the Pac-12 and Genius Sports were not returned.

Rick Trachok, a law lecturer at University of California, Berkeley, and a senior attorney specializing in gaming law, said he’s “shocked” to see USU participate and believes the school is crossing a legal line.

“What in the hell is a Utah university thinking of in even allowing this?” he asked.

Trachok said while “aiding and abetting” is typically a term used in criminal cases for someone helping facilitate a crime, he sees a similar involvement with USU installing the cameras and allowing for betting on its teams.

“They’re basically aiding and abetting gambling,” he added.

USU’s spokesperson Amanda DeRito said in a statement to The Tribune that the system “does not allow for gambling in Utah.” But it’s unclear how that will be enforced in digital spaces, which has been the same issue with Kalshi, DraftKings and other popular sports betting apps that don’t have geolocators.

Genius Sports did a site visit at the Spectrum in May to speak with USU facility management crews about how to correctly install the cameras. A copy of the company’s guidance was shared with The Tribune.

It shows that USU is directly responsible for buying cabling and brackets for the installation of the cameras. The guidance then shows the 12 spots around the arena where Genius Sports’ cameras are supposed to be mounted. A picture shared with The Tribune of one of the cameras already mounted shows Genius Sports’ icon on it.

The document also notes that the Genius Sports system needs to be connected to the venue’s official clock feed “to effectively parse and send data back to Genius Sports.” They’re also connected to USU’s internet network.

Trachok emphasized that means using equipment from a public school in Utah, funded by state and taxpayer dollars, to facilitate the data transfer then used for gambling.

He noted that televising a live game, which USU and most schools already do, is different. The feeds used by sportsbooks are delayed by milliseconds to allow in-play bets.

Even if the gambling is physically taking place in other states, he said, it feels legally murky when it’s banned under Utah’s constitution.

The Pac-12 has framed the partnership with Genius Sports as a way to control and impose “meaningful integrity restrictions” on sportsbooks. A March news release about the agreement names Genius Sports as the “exclusive distributor of official data from Pac-12 competitions to licensed sportsbooks worldwide.”

The conference added it’s “all designed to combat the threat of betting-related corruption and protect student-athletes.” It does so by limiting “risk bet types,” it says.

Sportico reported that under the partnership, the Pac-12 “becomes one of just a handful of leagues to openly commercialize its gambling data.” The financial details of the deal were not publicly released.

The NCAA also has a relationship with Genius Sports for all post-season tournaments, including March Madness.

USU mentioned that in its statement, saying Genius Sports “is already used by nearly all NCAA schools.”

“Additionally,” the school said, “the cameras are used for capturing real-time analytics and performances for coaches and athletes to review and make real-time performance improvements.”