The state of Louisiana is suing Roblox over child safety concerns as the company’s stocks fall 10% in a matter of days.
It’s been a wild couple of days for the gaming giant Roblox, which has faced criticism and backlash following a slew of concerns about child safety.
Roblox has faced continuous allegations over the years about its lack of infrastructure to protect children, and “vigilante” users have decided to step in to catch predators.
On Wednesday, Roblox posted a lengthy statement to its website defending its decision to ban such users, claiming that those users have taken “actions that are both unacceptable and create an unsafe environment for users.” The statement was released around the same time as one popular user named ‘Schlep’, who catches predators on Roblox, was banned on the platform for such activities.
As allegations and concerns persist, Louisiana’s top prosecutor, Attorney General Liz Murrill, has filed a lawsuit against Roblox, accusing the platform of failing to do more to protect children.
The 42-page filing states that tens of millions of users can easily create accounts with false birthdays, and the system is easily passed by adults posing as children.
The suit outlines several different games within Roblox, including “Escape to Epstein Island,” referencing convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a game called “Public Showers,” where users can roleplay and relax together, and over 600 games relating to Sean “Diddy” Combs / P Diddy.
This isn’t the first time that Roblox has faced criticism, either, and the company has been slated for not doing more to protect children. In 2019, a 19-year-old groomed 150 children using Roblox. In June 2021, 18-year-old Ron Machluf was indicted for using Roblox “to lure and commit sexual offenses against several girls between the ages of 7 and 12.”
In a more recent case in 2024, a 21-year-old Chilean man was arrested at LAX airport “on suspicion of contacting a minor for a sexual offense” after meeting a 13-year-old girl on Roblox and booking an Airbnb near her home
The continuous allegations have prompted Chris Hansen to investigate Roblox’s issues, saying that he’s “already interviewed law enforcement investigators and victims of this horrible activity.”
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Tom Henderson is Insider Gaming's Co-Founder and Editor-In-Chief. When he's not running one of the industry's leading independent video game websites, he's probably playing an FPS like Call of Duty,…
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