Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall announced April 21 that the state has “reached a substantial settlement with the popular interactive gaming platform Roblox, securing meaningful improvements to online child safety and boots-on-the ground resources for Alabama’s schoolchildren,” according to a news release from the attorney general’s office.
Under the settlement terms, the release noted, Alabama will receive $12.2 million to be used for funding school resource officers across the state via the Attorney General’s Safe School Initiative.
Framework for ‘other states’
“This settlement sends a clear message to every platform operating in this space — you cannot turn a blind eye to the exploitation of children and expect to avoid consequences,” Marshall noted in a news release. “We have now established a framework that other states can and should use. Platforms that host child consumers must do their part to give parents a fighting chance to shield their children from harm. While parents will always play the primary role in protecting their children online, we are raising the bar on what we expect from gaming platforms— parents need a partner, not a black box. This is the beginning of a new standard, and Alabama will aggressively enforce it.”
As a part of the agreement with Roblox, the release said, “all users must undergo age verification to ensure children have access only to age-appropriate content on the platform. Roblox has committed to using facial age estimation technology and government- issued ID for age confirmation and will use behavioral monitoring to identify users who may have been aged incorrectly. The settlement also explicitly addresses privacy concerns related to age verification.”
Parents will have ‘expanded control’
Parents, the report continued, will also have “expanded control over their children’s use of the platform under the agreement. The expansion of parental controls allows parents to decide who their children are talking to and the games they are playing on the platform as well as restrict the transfer of in-game currency (Robux) from adults other than trusted connections. In the absence of a parent account, the default content mode provides protections to minor users.”
Adult users and users under 16 will not be able to chat unless they are identified as a “trusted friend” on the platform, the release said: “Trusted friends for users under 13 require parental consent. Unless a parent elects otherwise, users between 13 and 15 years old may add trusted friends through a QR code or phone contact importer.”
Under the agreement, Roblox will not allow communication involving minors to be encrypted. Unencrypted communication allows law enforcement to be able to more easily combat child exploitation networks, trafficking, and the distribution of illegal and harmful content.
“Roblox has committed to conducting workshops and awareness campaigns for the state of Alabama and local law enforcement, as well as establishing a liaison position that will provide state law enforcement with communication channels to quickly investigate and address safety concerns like online child exploitation,” the release said.
The settlement is reportedly one of the first in the nation to be reached with Roblox and is the result of negotiations over the last several months.
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by the Attorney General’s office.
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