As someone who's played Roblox for over 10 years, I am concerned about the new age-based updates that Roblox is rolling out. They plan to introduce age-based accounts titled Roblox Kids (for those under 9), Roblox Select (for those under 15), and the standard Roblox (for 16+). While this update may be good in intents to keep minors safer, I believe it will not do anything to make minors safer.

Separating all accounts into layers/groups based on age is only a temporary, short-term solution. It may initially decrease the amount of predators on the site, but the problem is the current age verification mandates that Roblox has are ineffective. People have been shown to put accessories on their face or make fake IDs to simply bypass age verification systems in countries such as the UK and Australia, and also applying to Roblox. Because ID verification tends to be skewed and flawed, it will actually increase the amount of predators rather than decreasing them, so it will in turn lead to more people getting groomed as predators find ways around them to make "Roblox Kids" accounts. Not to mention, the ID verification can severely risk data breaches, which would end up getting Roblox into a lawsuit if this were to happen. People could wrongly end up being marked as a "kids" or "select" account.

In addition, it shifts parental responsibility to a corporate, "one-size-fits all" solution. Parents are supposed to be responsible for setting restrictions on Roblox and tell their kids what or what not to do. However, these new mandates are just essentially arbitrary "one-size-fits all" solutions that may not cater to the needs of all Roblox players. Websites themselves should not decide what restrictions on Roblox a kid should have entirely. That should be their parents/family.

We demand Roblox to scrap plans for the "Roblox Kids" and "Roblox Select" account concepts and instead, demand that they instead implement stronger parental controls and education systems for parents and families to actually make the platform safer and how they can monitor their kids on Roblox, alongside working with trusted organizations to decrease the amount of predators on the site and make the site safer for minor users. That being said, we can make Roblox still fun and enjoyable but at the same time, allowing flexible options for users based on their needs rather than just mediocre "one size fits all" solutions that do not do anything to help the company.