Overview
- Senators Josh Hawley and Dick Durbin, which sent a joint letter Thursday, directed Roblox and CEO David Baszucki to preserve and produce documents on child safety by Aug. 31 as part of a Senate Judiciary subcommittee investigation.
- The letter accuses Roblox of being used to trade child sexual abuse material, host sexually explicit virtual experiences with minors, bribe and extort children to produce explicit content, and to lure children into in-person meetings, citing a decade of law-enforcement cases including arrests for grooming, sexual abuse, kidnapping, rape, and murder.
- Roblox faces nearly a dozen pending lawsuits and previously paid $35 million in settlements in Alabama, Nevada, and West Virginia over related claims, with those settlements not requiring the company to admit wrongdoing.
- Roblox’s chief safety officer, Matt Kaufman, said the company does not compromise on safety and that Roblox will provide facts and documents to the senators in response to the request.
- The inquiry is led by the subcommittee’s chair and ranking member, giving it formal oversight power and the potential to prompt public hearings, further litigation pressure, and regulatory scrutiny of how user-generated platforms detect and block abuse involving children.