The maker of game creation system Roblox is being sued by the state of Louisiana in an effort to hold the company “accountable for the facilitation and distribution of child sexual abuse material […] and for the sexual exploitation of Louisiana’s minor children,” according to court documents filed this week by the state’s attorney general.
The state alleges that Roblox Corporation has failed to implement substantial safety controls and “has knowingly enabled and facilitated the systemic sexual exploitation and abuse of children across the United States.” According to the state’s lawsuit, Roblox Corporation has “permitted and perpetuated an online environment in which child predators thrive, directly contributing to the widespread victimization of minor children.”
“Roblox is overrun with harmful content and child predators because it prioritizes user growth, revenue, and profits over child safety,” said Louisiana attorney general Liz Murrill in a statement. “Every parent should be aware of the clear and present danger poised to their children by Roblox so they can prevent the unthinkable from ever happening in their own home.”
Roblox Corporation responded to Louisiana’s lawsuit to “address erroneous claims and misconceptions about our platform, our commitment to safety, and our overall safety track record.” The company called out new features that “protect its youngest users and empower parents and caregivers with greater control, including updated parental controls, stricter defaults for users under 13, and new content maturity labels.” The company also highlighted its age-estimation technology efforts, and its work with law enforcement and child-safety organizations to defend its position.
The Roblox platform has come under fire in recent years for failing to properly moderate its platform and protect children from predators who use the platform to chat with and, in some cases, abduct kids. Last year, Bloomberg published a massive report (“Roblox’s Pedophile Problem”) on the social gaming platform’s dangers to kids, noting that police in the U.S. “have arrested at least two dozen people accused of abducting or abusing victims they’d met or groomed using Roblox.”
A few months after that report, forensic financial research firm Hindenburg Research blasted Roblox Corporation for inflating key user metrics and called the platform an “X-rated pedophile hellscape, exposing children to grooming, pornography, violent content and extremely abusive speech.” Roblox rejected the claims made in Hindenburg Research’s report, calling its findings “misleading.”
Roblox said it averages about 111 million daily active users, who send more than 6 billion chat messages and 1.1 million hours of voice through the platform. That data came from a recent post from Roblox on its decision to ban in-game “vigilantes” — notably the Roblox user known as Schlep — who have attempted to ensnare child predators and report them to law enforcement.