Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing Roblox for allegedly “deceiving parents” and “flagrantly ignoring” safety laws. It follows similar action Paxton has taken against “several Big Tech social media companies” and TikTok.
“I’m suing Roblox for putting pixel pedophiles and profits over the safety of Texas children,” Paxton wrote in a social media post. “We cannot allow platforms like Roblox to continue operating as digital playgrounds for predators where the well-being of our kids is sacrificed on the altar of corporate greed.”
In a press statement, Paxton expanded on this, writing he was suing Roblox Corporation, “a multi-billion-dollar company that operates one of the largest online gaming sites for children, for flagrantly ignoring state and federal online safety laws while deceiving parents about the dangers of its platform.”
Roblox is one of the biggest video game platforms in the world, and has seen enormous user numbers as a result of experiences such as Grow a Garden and Steal a Brainrot going viral. Paxton claimed that though Roblox markets itself as a safe space, it has become a “breeding ground for predators.”
“Children in Texas have been repeatedly exposed to sexually explicit content, exploitation, and grooming because Roblox chose to put pixel pedophiles and corporate profit over the safety of Texas children,” he added.
“Roblox must do more to protect kids from sick and twisted freaks hiding behind a screen. Any corporation that enables child abuse will face the full and unrelenting force of the law.”
IGN has contacted Roblox for comment. Roblox told the BBC it is “disappointed” that it is being sued based on “misrepresentations and sensationalised claims.” A spokesperson said it shares Paxton’s commitment to keeping children safe online and that it has introduced measures to remove bad actors and protect its users.
In Roblox’s most recent Safety Snapshot, the company said it “continue[s] to innovate around safety,” and revealed it had open-sourced a version of Roblox PII Classifier, which “has significantly enhanced” its ability to detect and block attempts to violate its policies around sharing personally identifiable information (PII).
“Since its implementation, PII conversation recall in English has risen to 98%, outperforming other leading open-source models,” Roblox said, adding that it was also committed to more transparency for users to report “anything problematic.”
“We know users expect more information about what happens when they report something on Roblox, so we’ve broadened the list of categories that we respond to,” it added. “Across all report types, we now let users know when we’ve taken action in response to their report. This has resulted in 250% more feedback provided to users about the reports they’ve filed.”
Photo by Thomas Fuller/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images.
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world’s biggest gaming sites and publications. She’s also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
