Keep kids off Roblox if worried, CEO Dave Baszucki tells parents

The CEO of the giant gaming platform said that parents who do not want their children on Roblox do not allow them to use it.

The site, which is the most popular in the UK among young players between the ages of eight to 12 years, has been exposed by claims that some children are subjected to clear or harmful content through their games, as well as multiple allegations of bullying and grooming.

But the co -founder and CEO Dave Bastzuki insisted that the company is vigilant in protecting its users and indicated that “tens of millions” of people have “amazing experiences” on the site.

When asked about his message to parents who do not want their children on the platform, Mr. Baszucki said: “It will be my first message, if you are not comfortable, do not let your children on Roblox.”

“This looks little intuitive, but I always trust parents to make their own decisions,” BBC News told BBC News in an exclusive interview.

The US -based Roblox is one of the largest gaming platforms in the world, with two monthly societies than Nintendo Switch and Sony PlayStation. In 2024, its average was more than 80 million players per day-approximately 40 % of them under the age of 13. Its vast empire includes about 40 million games and experiences created by users.

In the UK, the online safety law, which comes to power in April, aims to strict laws for all technology companies that specifically aim to protect children from online damage.

But Mr. Baszucki says he is still confident of the safety tools in Roblox and insists that the company exceeds it to maintain the safety of its users.

“We are doing in the company the situation that any bad accident, even one bad accident, is one more than that,” he says.

“We see bullying, monitor harassment, and filter all these types of things, and I would like to say behind the scenes, and the analysis extends to whether necessary, if necessary, communicate with law enforcement.”

Players who choose not to view what he calls “CIVIITY” can face a tallest time and a longer ban, and Roblox claims to analyze all connections that pass between members on the platform, and are increasingly used artificial intelligence systems and other technology to do this-and anything that is sent for further investigation.

In November of last year, less than 13 years were prevented from sending direct messages, as well as playing in “Hangout Experiments”, which is characterized by chatting between the players.

However, the British Broadcasting Corporation managed to create two fake accounts, one between the ages of 15 and one from 27 years old, on unrelated devices and the exchange of messages between the two.

While the filters have caught our attempts to move the conversation publicly to a different platform, we have found easy ways to return the word “requests” to chat elsewhere and make suggestions about playing more adult games.

When we showed the President of Roblox these results, he said that our example is the most prominent comparative safety of Roblox: that people felt that they had to take the content that may violate the Roblox rules to other platforms.

“We do not condone any kind of sharing photos on our basic system, and you will see us get more and more, I think, beyond the place of the law in this type of behavior,” says Mr. Bastuki.

He admits that there is an accurate balance between encouraging friendships among young people and prohibiting the opportunities available to them, but he says he is confident that Roblox can manage both.

We also put some Roblox game titles that the BBC discovered by the platform to a 11 -year -old child, including:

• “Late the night and girls, RP Club”
• “Special Forces Simulation”
• “Houfa Game”
• “Get the planes … why not?”

When we asked whether he believed they were suitable, he said he puts his faith in the ages of the platform.

“One thing is really important to the way we do things here, it is not only on the title of experience, it is literally on the content of the experiment as well,” he says.

He insists that when Roblox rates are testing, they pass through strict guidelines and that the company has a “consistent policy” in that.

Mr. Baszucki established the platform with Eric Cassel in 2004 and issued to the public in 2006 – a year before the first iPhone appeared in Apple, preaching the beginning of the era of the smartphone.

Mr. Baszucki describes himself as the youngest as “less than a player and more than one engineer”, and the first company for the couple was an educational program called CR Revolution. But soon they noticed that the children did not use the product only to perform their homework.

He says: “They wanted to play and build things.

The name Roblox was a phrase “robot” and blocs-which is stuck. The platform rapidly grew in its popularity-and there were also early warning signs of its future issues.

Mr. Cassel noticed that some players “began to act” and not always behave in a “civilized” way two months after its launch, as Mr. Basaki remembers.

He says that the roots of building a “confidence and safety system” said so began “very early”, and that in those previous days there were four people who act as safety supervisors.

“It is what kind of CIVILITY Safety Foundation.”

But despite the attraction of decent numbers, it was a year later, when the company launched its digital currency, it really started earning money.

Players buy Robux and use it to buy accessories and open content. Content creators now get 70 % of the drawings, and the store is on a dynamic pricing, which means that common elements cost more.

Mr. Baszucki says there is some initial resistance between the Roblox leadership team, which has become more than just a hobby for players, with the introduction of the digital economy.

Robox remained, and the company is now 41 billion dollars (31 billion pounds).

The price of his share has fluctuated since it took place in 2021, but the total Robox shares worth about a third of more than six months, at the time of writing this report. Like many large technology companies, their peak is of Covid, when locks mean millions of people inside.

Mr. Baszucki compares his experience in building Roblox with how Walt Disney felt about his creations.

He describes his job as “somewhat similar to that he has a long time ago when he was designing the magic kingdom”, and focuses on the continuous development of Roblox in a twin -style experience where people walk in their daily lives in a virtual world, in the form of symbolism.

They were also public in their ambitions to attract 10 % of the world’s players.

Request to describe Roblox in three words, replied: “The future of communication.”

We finish together in playing some of its favorite games: staying alive in natural disasters and dressing to impress.

We use his account and is constantly recognized by other players – but we are still destroying it by a snowstorm outside the palace of natural disasters.

Additional reports by AMMIE Sekhon