Ofcom urged to act after US firm claims Roblox is ‘paedophile hellscape’
Child safety campaigners have urged the UK communications watchdog to make a “step-change” in its implementation of new online laws after a video game firm was accused of making its platform an “X-rated paedophile hellscape”.
Hindenburg Research claimed Roblox’s games exposed children to grooming, pornography, violent content and abusive speech. The company, which has stated that it is seeking to profit from a fall in Roblox’s share price by taking out a so-called “short” position on the company’s stock, added it had found multiple accounts named using variations of Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier and child sexual abuser, and had been able to set up an account under the name of a notorious American paedophile.
“We found Roblox to be an X-rated paedophile hellscape, replete with users attempting to groom our avatars, groups openly trading child pornography, widely accessible sex games, violent content and extremely abusive speech – all of which is open to young children,” said Hindenburg.
“Every day, tens of millions of users of all ages have safe and positive experiences on Roblox and abide by the company’s community standards. However, any safety incident is horrible. We take any content or behaviour on the platform that doesn’t abide by our standards extremely seriously,” said the company.
