According to an announcement made by Roblox on Friday, it would no longer permit users under 13 years of age to message others outside of games and experiences on the platform. In addition, Roblox unveiled other series of built-in protections for its young users, including age-gating certain experiences with enhanced parental controls.

Roblox has, at various times been criticized for not sufficiently protecting its users, especially children and even young users, from online predators. These new features seem like a do-or-die attempt to regain that lost trust. Roblox reportedly has many 'predators waiting to be groomed', as per a recent Bloomberg investigation.

Just a few days later, Roblox said it would announce measures to protect kids better on the platform. Now, it is rolling out protections and giving parents more information and control over the use of the platform by their children.

The company stated, while briefing the press, that users under 13 will still be able to access in-game chats because it believes communication is fundamental to gameplay on the platform, but if a user wants to directly message another person either inside or outside a game, they need to ask their parent's permission to do so.

Another feature of Roblox is age-gating certain experiences for users under 13 years of age. New restrictions include games and experiences designed for socializing with people outside a person's friends list, such as experiences that allow free-form writing or drawing.

“The reason that we’ve made this decision is that we’ve seen that some of both the content and the conduct in these experiences is more appropriate for older users and teams,” said Dina Lamdany, Roblox’s product lead for user settings and parental controls, during the press briefing.

Although Roblox has had some parental controls in place, it only allowed them to be controlled from a child's account. Now, the company introduces remote management, which allows parents to update controls and review activity on their child's account from their own devices. Parents can connect their own Roblox account to their child's after ID verification or credit-card transactions.

Until now, Roblox has branded experiences according to age, mainly because the content had varying maturity levels. The company is now introducing clear descriptions for the content types that people can expect on its platform. An experience considered "minimal" means it "may contain occasional mild violence, light unrealistic blood, and/or occasional mild fear." The "mild" rating means that an experience "may contain repeated mild violence, heavy unrealistic blood, mild crude humor, and/or repeated mild fear."

An experience labeled "moderate" will contain "moderate violence, light realistic blood, moderate crude humour, unplayable gambling content, and/or moderate fear." A "restricted" experience "may contain strong violence, heavy realistic blood, moderate crude humor, romantic themes, unplayable gambling content, the presence of alcohol, strong language, and/or moderate fear."

With users under the age of 9, the default setting would be "minimal" or "mild content-only", with access to "moderate content" only possible after parental permission. Parents can choose the level they think is best for their child.

It automatically removes its built-in protections within Roblox once the child outgrows those protections and is moved into another age group. Parents will be given 30 days' notice before their child's settings are moved into another age category.

"We truly strive to be safety by design for users of all ages, and our policies and features will only continue to evolve to serve that end," said Lamdany. "We believe doing so is the right thing for kids, parents, creators, investors, and the company at large."

All the announced changes will be available to all users this week.