There are growing calls for the federal government to address the risks posed to children on the popular gaming platform Roblox after Guardian Australia published a report that documented a week of virtual sexual harassment and violence.
While playing as an eight-year-old girl, the reporter was given a sexualised avatar, cyberbullied, aggressively killed, sexually assaulted and shat on – all with parental control settings in place.
While platforms including Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube and Kick will soon be included under Australia’s social media ban, which will prevent Australians under 16 from having social media accounts from 10 December, Roblox is not.
The independent MP Monique Ryan said this was “inexplicable”. “Online gaming platforms like Roblox offer children unmoderated exposure to gambling, cloned social media apps, and explicit content,” she said.
At a press conference on Wednesday, the eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, said platforms were assessed by their “sole and significant purpose”.
“Kids who are using Roblox today, they use the chat functionality and messaging so that they can online gameplay,” she said. “If the online gameplay … were taken away, would the kids still use that messaging functionality to chat? Probably not.
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“If they start rolling out features that look more like they’re becoming a social media company than an online gaming company, then we will seek to capture them.”
The regime rules created by the government stipulate that services that have the primary purpose of enabling users to play online games with others are not age‑restricted social media platforms.
But some critics suggested this is too limited for platforms that merge gameplay and social interaction. Niusha Shafiabady, an associate professor of information technology at Australian Catholic University, believes Roblox should be included in the ban.
She pointed to the way the platform allows players to create content and interact. “It’s exactly like a contained social media platform,” she said.
The independent MP Nicolette Boele urged the government to reconsider. “If the government’s plan bans some apps but leaves platforms like Roblox – described as a ‘paedophile hellscape’ – untouched, then we’re not protecting kids, we’re driving them into more dangerous, less regulated spaces,” she said.
A spokesperson for the communications minister, Anika Wells, said the decision not to include Roblox under the teen social media ban did not mean it was exempt from its responsibilities under the Online Safety Act.
A spokesperson for eSafety said it “has been able to extract important safety commitments from Roblox that will protect children from a range of harms including online grooming and sexual coercion”.
By the end of the year, eSafety said Roblox will be rolling out age-assurance technologies, not allowing adults to contact children without specific parental consent and making accounts private by default for those under 16.
“After a child aged under 16 has gone through age estimation and has chat enabled, they will be unable to chat with adults. Parental controls will also be introduced to allow parents to disable chat for 13- to 15-year-old users, on top of existing protections for under 13s,” the spokesperson said.
The agency has enforcement powers if companies like Roblox do not comply with codes and standards for child safety, including penalties of up to $49.5m.
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eSafety said it “will closely monitor the implementation of these commitments from Roblox and will consider regulatory action in cases of future non-compliance”.
Joanna Orlando, a digital wellbeing expert at Western Sydney University, said the two key safety concerns with Roblox were the risk of grooming and the growing monetisation of children playing “the biggest game in the world”.
She said it was misleading to consider it as purely a video game. “It’s so much more – there are lots of social layers, there are a lot of people – there is everyone and anyone on that platform,” she said.
The Greens communications spokesperson, Sarah Hanson-Young, said the government was “trying to play whack-a-mole” with the social media ban.
“I want big tech companies held to account to ensure that children, whatever age … are safe,” she said.
“We’ve got to hit these companies where it hurts, and that’s their business model and the government is scared of doing that.”
The shadow communications minister, Melissa McIntosh, also raised concerns about the platform. She said while Roblox had committed to stronger safeguards, “we as parents must still be vigilant to protect our children online”.
“The eSafety Commissioner and the government have a responsibility to do everything they can to keep our kids safe from the growing threat of online predators,” she said.
A Roblox spokesperson said the platform was “committed to leading in safety through rigorous policies that go above and beyond what other platforms do”.
“We use AI to check for violative content before a game is published, we do not allow users to share images or videos in chat, and we use advanced text filters designed to stop kids from sharing personal information,” he said.
