In this Legal Insights series, attorney Andrea Johnstone answers frequently asked legal questions surrounding the ongoing litigation against Roblox. This Q&A covers the background of the case, its current status, and the legal implications for families and the platform itself.
What Is the Roblox Child Abuse Litigation About?
This litigation is about protecting children and holding Roblox and Discord accountable for prioritizing profits over child safety. This litigation focuses on Roblox’s reckless business operations aimed at children while failing to implement adequate safeguards, thereby allowing sexual predators access to vulnerable children.
Who Filed the Lawsuit(s), and What Are the Main Allegations?
Dozens of individual lawsuits have been filed across the country on behalf of children who were harmed by adult predators they met on Roblox. The litigation alleges, amongst other things, that Roblox recklessly and deceptively operated a business that could harm children, failed to invest in adequate safeguards to protect them, misrepresented the safety and appropriateness of their product to grow users and profits, designed their platform to be easily accessible to children without proper verification, negligently designed their business with unreasonable safety defects, and failed to warn parents of the dangers and risks.
Is This a Class Action or an Individual Case?
This is not a class action; this is a Multi-District Litigation (MDL). An MDL is a large group of individual cases that share common core facts and issues but are consolidated before one judge for efficiency. Each client still maintains their own individual case with their own specific circumstances.
What Are the Latest Updates in the Roblox Litigation?
In December 2025, the Judicial Panel on Multi-District Litigation granted MDL consolidation. The United States District Court for the Northern District of California was designated to oversee the litigation for pre-trial work. We’re in the early stages and will look to the Court on next steps in the discovery process.
How Could This Type of Abuse Occur on a Platform Like Roblox?
Roblox created an environment where the abuse of children was predictable and tragic, despite the company spending years misrepresenting Roblox’s safety to parents and the public. The platform gave adult predators a perfect hunting ground by:
- Making it extremely easy for children to access Roblox (free download, available on multiple devices)
- Requiring no phone number or email to sign up (only a birthdate, username, and password)
- Having no age verification system (users can enter any birthdate they wish, regardless of accuracy)
- Having no minimum age requirement
- Stating that children need parental permission, but taking no steps to verify or confirm permission
Until late 2024, users with birthdates listed as 18+ could easily “friend” and chat with any other user, including those with birthdates that would make them minors. Nothing prevented adults from entering fake birthdates to pose as children, too.
Roblox was designed to be interactive and actively encouraged communication between users through direct messaging and voice chats. Some games even required users to communicate with each other to play the game as designed. This means total strangers are encouraged to communicate with each other, simply by clicking on the same game.
Adult predators exploited these weaknesses by:
- Posing as children to befriend victims
- Building trust to groom children
- Sending explicit content to children
- Manipulating, threatening, and bribing children to create and send child sexual assault material (CSAM)
- Convincing children to move conversations to other platforms for more secretive communication and additional points of access (Discord, Snapchat, Instagram, encrypted messaging apps)
- Threatening children not to tell their parents
- In some cases, stalking, kidnapping, or manipulating children into meeting in person to sexually assault them
Were Parents Ever Warned About Potential Risks to Children?
No. Roblox misrepresented facts to parents, leading them to believe Roblox was safe for children. Parents were never warned of the risks nor informed about the child abuse reports that Roblox continued to receive. This misrepresentation was deliberate: if parents removed their children from Roblox, the company would lose money.
What Penalties or Damages Could Result From the Case?
Like any litigation, it’s uncertain what damages, if any, could be awarded.
How Can I Tell if My Child May Have Been Affected?
Parents should speak with their children about their online experiences and interactions on Roblox. Watch for signs of distress, changes in behavior, secretiveness about online activities, or reluctance to discuss their online interactions.
What Information or Evidence Should Families Preserve?
If you believe your child was harmed and would like to investigate a potential claim:
- Do not delete anything!
- Confirm the Roblox username your child used (the child might recall it, or it might be saved and visible on the app or in the device’s password manager—this doesn’t mean logging into the account)
- Save any police reports
- Request reports from schools if you discussed the situation with them
- Obtain medical records from therapists or providers your child saw concerning this issue
- Remember: If there’s any possibility of CSAM on a device, do not save, delete, or send it to anyone. Under no circumstances should you ever send CSAM to our law firm. Contact law enforcement for guidance.