Safety in video games isn’t what you likely think about when you’re playing most video games. That’s because, for many titles, it’s not required outside of just being able to play the game without issues and having a secure internet connection. However, when you get to massively multiplayer games like Roblox, where you’ll be able to interact with hundreds, if not thousands, of players at any moment in the game, things can be a bit more complicated. The dev team has promised people up and down that “their game is safe” and “can be made safe for kids,” but recent events have painted that belief in a dubious light.
To try and lessen some of those fears, the chief safety officer of Roblox Matt Kaufman talked with WESH 2 and discussed many elements of the safety features within the game:
“When we think about safety at Roblox, it’s our number one priority. We think about safety, particularly for children and teens. Anytime something happens like what you just reported on, we take it extremely seriously, and we have zero tolerance for any of that activity. Our policies are different than what you’ll find in other social media applications. For example, we monitor all communications, we don’t encrypt anything, and we don’t allow the sharing of images between our users.”
That might be true, but that hasn’t stopped various acts against children and teens from happening, including some that happened very recently via grooming and even kidnapping!
Curiously, when Kaufman was asked about how “parents could protect their kids in the game,” his answer wasn’t as definitive as you might think, as he noted that since “teens have multiple accounts online,” the team couldn’t protect them, on “all of them.” Just as curious was his notes that the best thing for parents to do to protect their kids was simply to talk with them about the game:
“Like anything that is online, I think parents should pay attention to what their kids are doing, and have a conversation. Because the most important thing to keep kids safe is just to be talking to them about what they’re doing.”
While that’s a “noble idea,” it’s not one that can work in many cases. Most parents don’t talk to kids about the video games they’re playing because they don’t understand gaming as a whole. Plus, sometimes parents don’t have TIME to do that, let alone have deep discussions about them. Or, the kids don’t want to talk about it and even lie about what’s happening online.
That’s why many have asked for stronger safety features for the game so that players can be protected and not have to rely on others outside the game to save them.
