We are sharing an update on key changes users and developers in the European Union (EU) will begin seeing on our platform in response to the European Union’s Digital Services Act (DSA). These changes generally apply to developers and users located in the EU and do not require any action to be taken.
The DSA regulates providers of online services like Roblox in the EU. It sets out new rules which aim to tackle harmful content and gives EU-based users new rights.
At Roblox, safety and civility are the foundation of everything we do. We prioritize safety and have invested resources to comply with regulations that provide users with greater transparency and more rights.
Here is a summary of the key changes we’ve made in light of the DSA, which affected developers and users will start seeing on Roblox by February 17th:
Ads Audiences: Advertisers will no longer be able to select gender when creating ads in Ads Manager that reach users aged 13-17 in certain locations in Europe. Information such as location, age, and device will be available to serve ads to these users.
Note: Existing ad campaigns reaching users aged 13-17 by gender in certain locations in Europe will stop running on February 15th.
Increased Moderation Transparency: Roblox will provide EU-based developers and users with reasons for moderation decisions that Roblox makes, information about their new rights under the DSA, and whether automated processes were involved in detecting/taking action on their content. Information about moderation actions will also be publicly reported to the EU Commission’s transparency database.
Appeals: Developers and Users in the EU are able to appeal Roblox moderation decisions for up to 6 months. Developers and Users in the EU will also have the right to escalate Roblox moderation decisions to certified out-of-court dispute settlement systems.
Illegal Content Reporting: Anyone located in the European Union has a way to report content that they believe violates EU law or Member States laws on the platform.
For everyone globally, we also offer additional transparency measures about ads, recommendations, ranking, and content moderation to make it easier to understand how our internal systems work.
Thank you.
FAQ
I have an ad campaign that will run past February 15th Pacific Time that is intended to reach European audiences. Will I get a refund?
Any unused ad credits will be refunded to the advertiser’s ad credit balance within 24-48 hours after the campaign ends.
Advertisers using credit or debit card are only charged for the performance of active campaigns so refunds will not be applicable in this instance.
That’s good to hear. But, why only Europe? Don’t we all deserve to know why our account was terminated or banned if we did nothing wrong? Imagine people were sent to jail and never being told why.
Some people live off developing games or making UGC here. It would not be fair to be deleted without knowing why. Is it only Europe because of some new law? I don’t think we need a new law in the US or other countries to determine if we get the information we deserve.
I hope you understand. This is a good change, but I’m concerned on why this hasn’t been universal. If I’ve been mistaken on what this announcement means, please educate me.
In my opinion, these should absolutely be rolled out to all users over time. EU users being the only ones with exclusive access to necessities like moderation transparency and enhanced reporting is unfair to the rest of the world.
By no means have I read the EU laws (since the EU forced roblox’s hand to make these changes), but these should have been implemented long ago, laws or not.
It would be nice if Roblox decided to extend some of these changes to all users without being legally compelled to. Particularly the increased moderation transparency including whether automated processes were involved, a longer window of time to appeal, and better mechanisms for reporting illegal content. I think it would be great if all users could benefit from those changes.
Edit: Glad to immediately see everybody else was on the same page about the “why not everyone else” thing.
Why EU only??? This should be basic common sense - not something EU only or locked behind region. People have been begging for moderation transparency for years now, only giving it to EU users is not fair.
Roblox should not wait for new laws for more transparency to their users. For government stuff that makes sense since the systems they develop come with new laws however Roblox can do the work themselves for more transparency to the end user. And in this case, it was already done for the ones in EU.
Good changes! They’re extremely useful, and extra transparency is always welcomed especially when coupled with moderation improvements. As others have said, rolling out these changes worldwide would be excellent as well, other than that thanks for the heads up!
It’s great to see Roblox comply with the DSA. As someone who resides in the EU, these changes are amazing, and help us exercise our rights as european citizens, but why only us?
When some of these changes, like moderation transparency and appealing are something, that everyone should access to? Many other platforms allow global users to access them, while also being DSA compliant. I see zero reason to not allow non-EU players to access full moderation reasons and be able to appeal their moderations. I hope this changes, but still a great beginning move!
This sounds great but can you tell us more about the ‘ Increased Moderation Transparency’ and the ‘appeals’.
Like does that mean developers and also globally, people can appeal for their accounts and Roblox will actually look into it and try unbanning it if the account was banned without any good reasoning?
Or does it only apply for game developers for their own game or something?
I feel like we deserve a real human response to this as well. Not “Hi all, thank you for the feedback, we value it”, because with your history you clearly don’t. This is a basic feature, it should be out globally too. I am not sure how we keep letting them get away with stuff like this but here we are.
I hope we’ll get a direct explanation as to why all developers can’t have these improvements. Or let us know if its actually planned for to be released for everyone.
Such a bummer that companies can isolate EU laws within EU and don’t simply provide the benefits to everyone. Roblox L actually for not showing care for everyone, only abiding by laws as far as the law goes. Also rip UK friends with brexit.
I’m really glad these changes are happening, it’s definitely a step in the right direction (even if it’s legally obligated). I think I saw not very long ago that EU users could also see the status of the reports (and whether they were actually reviewed)? I sure hope this is the case. It would be great submitting a report then finding out someone actually read and considered it.
That being said, it really sucks that us non-Europeans don’t get these “benefits” considering these should be standard practices. Hopefully it’s expanded to us in the future (or, if it has to come to it, that our countries adopt similar laws).
I think that’s a part of why the EU puts the rules in place too. It would be more work, or I assume it would be, to region lock the amount of features that Roblox is adding/supporting here. And, that’s my question too, why not support it for everyone in some capacity? Like, the system is already there, why lock it?
I’m sure something might conflict with another law in another country/place, but some more talk about it would be cool to see. Also, couldn’t we use a VPN to change our region or would that not be strong enough to try to reap benefits involved? Actually, that might be against TOS or a law (trying to benefit from EU law when not in the EU).
