Ofcom wird zum Handeln aufgefordert, nachdem US-Firma behauptet, Roblox sei „pädophile Höllenlandschaft“ | Aktivisten sagen, dass die Aufsichtsbehörde sicherstellen muss, dass das Online-Sicherheitsgesetz streng genug ist, nachdem Vorwürfe über Spieleplattformen erhoben wurden

Some key issues:

>Hindenburg Research claimed Roblox’s games exposed children to grooming, pornography, violent content and abusive speech. The company, which has stated that it is seeking to profit from a fall in Roblox’s share price by taking out a so-called “short” position on the company’s stock, added it had found multiple accounts named using variations of Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier and child sexual abuser, and had been able to set up an account under the name of a notorious American paedophile.
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>“We found Roblox to be an X-rated paedophile hellscape, replete with users attempting to groom our avatars, groups openly trading child pornography, widely accessible sex games, violent content and extremely abusive speech – all of which is open to young children,” said Hindenburg.
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>Roblox rejected Hindenburg’s allegations, saying safety and civility was “foundational” to the company.
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>“Every day, tens of millions of users of all ages have safe and positive experiences on Roblox and abide by the company’s community standards. However, any safety incident is horrible. We take any content or behaviour on the platform that doesn’t abide by our standards extremely seriously,” said the company.
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>One in five Roblox users are under nine years old and the majority are under 16. The platform offers a catalogue of games and allows players to socialise with each other including in chatrooms. There is no age limit, although the platform does advertise age recommendations for certain “experiences” and offers parental controls.
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>Roblox content is not authored by its developers, but instead by players. It provides the tools for children and teens to create their own simple gaming scenarios, and then play through them with friends. One popular Roblox “experience” has players working in a pizza parlour, and another involves a game of cops and robbers.
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>Child safety campaigners said the report underlined the need for Ofcom, the UK’s communications regulator, to implement the Online Safety Act as rigorously as possible and introduce strict codes of practice for tech companies.
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>An Ofcom spokesperson said the act would have a significant impact on online safety in the UK and the regulator would have a broad range of enforcement powers to protect users.
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>“Platforms – such as Roblox – will be required to protect children from pornography and violence, take action to prevent grooming, remove child abuse images, and introduce robust age-checks. We have set out clear recommended measures for how they can comply with these requirements in our draft codes.”
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>A Roblox spokesperson added that the company “fully” intended to comply with the OSA.

The intention to comply with regulations is always a good start, but more telling is what concrete actions are being taken, and how effective they are in the end.

Wow this is a crazy story. Hindenburg research posts usually about short opportunity theses often in regard to companies who misrepresent their financial status, and this is a double whammy. Not only does Roblox appear to be lying to investors about their KPIs and DAUs but the lack of a moderation at all seems absolutely crazy. Wouldn’t be surprised if this starts the process of the feds bringing the hammer down on Roblox

These platforms either need to be 18+ or they need to start taking children safety seriously. It’s absolutely ridiculous the type of stuff you can find on platforms like Roblox, VRChat, and even Discord, in spaces easily accessible by children. If they can’t moderate their platform to be child friendly, they should not have children on them.

People Make Games covered Roblox a while. It was telling back then, this time it might actually hurt Roblox where it hurts.

Roblox is a child exploitation engine from a foundational platform perspective. But I assume this won’t help that and will instead be an excuse for another terrible KOSA-like privacy killer.