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Roblox Will Request Video Selfies To Estimate Players' Age

As one of the biggest video game platforms in the world, and with a particularly high proportion of minors among its player base, Roblox has had to invest heavily in trust and safety technology over the past decade. As part of its ongoing effort to disrupt abuse, misuse, and harm, the company is rolling out a new system to verify players' age: "age estimation" through analysis of video selfies.

In a press release, Roblox announced that it is reconfiguring how its social features work to better protect minors from untrusted or potentially exploitative interactions. First, it is introducing a two-tiered "Connections" system to govern how players are linked to one another: normal and "Trusted Connections."

Two players who are Trusted Connections will be able to communicate with each other without restriction, including via party and text chat with no filters. However, becoming Trusted Connections will require clearing several hurdles designed to reduce the potential of child exploitation or other types of harm.

Most fundamentally, the Trusted Connections feature will only unlock if players verify their ages, which requires uploading an ID or using Roblox's new Age Estimation mechanism. This new system asks players to upload a video selfie, which is then processed by the company and compared against "a large and diverse dataset," according to the press release. Roblox promises that this data will be handled "securely," although the specific details of its privacy and security mechanisms related to video selfies were not shared.

Upon verifying age, players between 13-17 years old can create Trusted Connections with one another. If a minor wants to establish a Trusted Connection with a player over 18 years old, the minor will have to confirm a real-life relationship with the other person through a QR code or the uploading of a contact list. Under-13s will not be able to create these connections.

This effort to better protect under-18 players comes during a roller-coaster year for the company. The Roblox platform is host to Grow a Garden, an experience which broke Fortnite's record for most concurrent players online at one time back in June. However, researchers of online communities have continued to sound the alarm on Roblox's vulnerabilities, especially related to child safety.