Roblox's Major Parenting Controls Update Is Long Overdue

Finally, Roblox is giving parents more control and insight into what their children are doing in Roblox. Why did it take this long?

If you, like me, manage the Roblox account of a child, you probably received an email titled “new parental controls and insights are coming soon,” detailing noteworthy changes happening to the relationship between parental and child Roblox accounts.

“Next month, we’re changing the way parents manage their child’s experience on Roblox by introducing Roblox accounts with parent privileges,” reads the announcement, which has, so far, only been revealed via direct email to Roblox accounts with parental privileges and not openly discussed by the company.

This news comes, whether coincidence or happenstance, in the wake of damning reports about how Roblox handles (or doesn’t) content moderation on its platform. 

The response to that news was loud and angry—it prompted a sharp response from yours truly. But in the days since, the world had course corrected, per the excellent gaming business newsletter SuperJoost Playlist, written by Joost van Dreunen:

“Following the Hindenburg research report that sent a shockwave through the industry two weeks ago, everything has seemingly returned to normal. Market analysts have mostly brushed off the short-seller’s accusations, and reiterated their recommendation to buy the stock. Roblox’s rejection of the report’s findings and the firm’s investment in safety practices and updated parental controls it launched this week, business is back to normal.”

"The updates that were shared via email are part of Roblox’s commitment to making the platform one of the safest online environments for our users, particularly the youngest users,” said a Roblox spokesperson to Crossplay, who declined to elaborate on the timing of the news. “We’re excited to share more information next month.” 

The changes, changes that are a very long time coming, arrive next month and include:

• Parents can manage parental controls via their own device

Previously, this was only possible by logging into your child’s device/account. It was annoying! Now, controls work on your account. When I want to manage screen time for my daughters, I can make adjustments from my own phone, tablet, or computer.

• Usage reports, including “daily screen time and on-platform friends”

On iOS, at least, it’s possible to view (and limit) app usage. My understanding is it works similarly in the Google ecosystem. (I should buy some Google devices.) If you don’t have platform-wide screen time restrictions on a device—or screen time restrictions at all—you can still see how much time they’ve spent in an app. But Apple/Google can only see how long a child has played, not what’s happening inside.

• Parental PINs are going away

You could make changes to a child's account with a PIN code in the past. Now, it’s simply flagging a parent’s account and giving them remote access to the settings.

• Roblox experiences will not merely be age-gated, but content-gated, as well

This is useful. Roblox experiences have age ratings, but what if you want to prevent your child from all experiences with guns? It appears that’ll be possible with an update like this, because the parental controls will have granular options. We’ll have to see what Roblox comes up with for its “content labels” to see how specific it gets.

• Different default settings for children under the age of 13

This has driven me up a wall. It’s horrible idea that Roblox hasn’t defaulted to different settings based on age, but this a problem across social networks that has only shifted because of societal pressure and threats of legislation at the state and federal level. It’s worth diving into the specific changes that are happening here, too.

• Users under 13 need permission for “certain chat features”

We need more information. I think chat should be off by default for anyone under 13, but if you dig into Roblox’s own recommendations on this topic, the company formally advises against it because “doing so may make Roblox less enjoyable, since many of our games are built around the ability to chat with fellow Robloxians.”

• Users under nine need permission for experiences marked as having “moderate” content, which could include “moderate violence or moderate crude humor”

I might be okay with letting my kid into these experiences, but Roblox—and much of the internet aimed at kids—have taken the opposite approach, erring on the side of opt-out instead of opt-in. The default should be maximally locked down, with the parent and child having a conversation with one another about when to expand choice.

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As stated above, Roblox told me more information is coming “next month.”

My topline impression: about time. Roblox has been deeply negligent about its parental controls for years. What’s announced here isn’t something creative or new, it’s basic safety for any platform like it and they’re only arriving now under pressure.

Regardless, it’s a step in the right direction. More of this, please.

Have a story idea? Want to share a tip? Got a funny parenting story? Drop Patrick an email.

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Also:

• The chat stuff really bugs me. I want it gone on a permanent basis, and not something I gotta toggle with in the settings or whenever they boot it up.

• Very curious what Roblox means by “more,” though I suppose it probably means just a formal rollout of the features. I’m hoping to chat with them, but we’ll see.

• The reports about moderation made a big splash online, but I have not seen it come up in any of the online parenting circles that I frequent. It just floated by.