Roblox Adds Parental Controls, Will Require Permission for Young Players

in the middle News research on predators targeting children on the platform and a Class action lawsuit over gambling on some of its gamesRoblox is making changes to parental controls and minor access to the platform. Like First reported by BloombergThe company behind the popular online gaming platform sent an email to parents outlining the changes it’s making to Roblox.

Some of these changes include:

• Parental consent is required for users under 13 to access some chat features.

• Requiring parental consent for users under the age of 9 to play games that contain moderate violence or crude humor.

• By linking a Roblox account with parental privileges to their child’s account, parents will be able to access and change parental controls and monitor activity on Roblox, including daily screen time and friends on the platform.

• Account-related information about the child’s account, such as spending details, will no longer be sent to the parent’s email address; they will need to access it through the parent’s linked Roblox account.

Roblox sent a copy of the email to CNET upon request, and a spokesperson said: “Updates shared via email are part of Roblox’s commitment to making the platform one of the safest online environments for our users, especially our youngest users. ”

Roblox hasn’t officially announced these changes outside of this email, but it has told parents the changes will be released at an unspecified date next month, namely in November.

“Once these changes go into effect, your child will receive a notification inviting them to add a linked parent account and we will send you an email with instructions,” Roblox said in its message to parents.

Roblox started in July changing the way game content is tagged on the platformby adding more description about the content rather than labeling it according to the age it is appropriate for. In that case, Roblox told game developers“This change was prompted by user feedback and recognition that all children develop on different timelines, so labeling experiences by age does not meet the needs of every family.”

This change was also noted in the email sent to parents.

Criticisms about Roblox’s platform and underage users reflect larger shifts in parents’ concerns about the effects of social media on young users and teenagers. Dangers for underage users involving online gambling sites. Meta Major changes recently announced To young people’s accounts on Instagram. tiktok Introduced the Youth Council Earlier this year in an effort to make the platform safer for younger users. This all comes after a Pew Research study last year found that 81 percent of adults surveyed had come out. Preferred parental controls for minors using social media.

Roblox has about 80 million daily active users, and about 40 percent of those users are under the age of 13, according to Bloomberg research.

Roblox has been expanding lately Convert to VR. The game is already available on Quest headsets, adding virtual avatars for chat and incorporating generative AI elements to assist creators making content for the platform.