[NEWS]Roblox targeted in the Philippines for resembling gambling

[Fredomago]

Thanks for sharing that picture, @asriloni.

We wouldn’t have known that there are already many countries banning it. I think decisions like this are also influenced by what other countries are doing. If it’s already banned elsewhere, it becomes easier for the Philippines to follow.

Also, I don’t think the Philippines is really benefiting much from this kind of game, so there’s less reason to keep it. They might give some time before the official ban, but after that, implementation will likely push through.

It's a must as there are already countries who completely ban the game, as you said it won't be hard to also do similar action, the game is exposing those young minds into gambling and taking action like this will save those that ain't exposed yet, it's a decision that's needed to quickly execute, there are so many issues that's being focused but this one is also important to take care.

[salad daging]

This is a map of countries that already banned Roblox. There are 11 countries banned it, and they have banned Roblox due to the similar reason. Roblox is getting uncontrolled. It's now offering 18+ entertainment. It is starting to the minors who played it.

Including my country where the Roblox game is restricted to ages under 16 because there is a lot of inappropriate content in the game including 18+ sex adult entertainment where many children play roles there, this has indeed become uncontrollable which has finally led the government to take decisive action.

I myself have never played Roblox but don't know how there is a gambling mechanism there, maybe some kind of bet made by individuals? Roblox has now been mastered by many children because they see influencers playing this too often, making many children addicted.

[Davidvictorson]

The main concern people have about this is that the majority of Roblox players are underage, and they are being exposed to gambling and possibly getting exploited, too.

Kids can't really distinguish harm and they are the most vulnerable. There I agree that they either fix this issue immediately or become completely banned.
Is this the case with Roblox in other countries were they are allowed? Why would they wait to be threatened with a ban before they address the issue. The companies do not really care about people except for them making profit.

The Philippine government is going to ban Roblox on April 3, and the Roblox execs are going to the Philippines to have a dialogue with local authorities, but there is news that they will still continue to ban it

April 3 is in two days, we wait for the latest news from them.

[bakasabo]

I myself have never played Roblox but don't know how there is a gambling mechanism there, maybe some kind of bet made by individuals? Roblox has now been mastered by many children because they see influencers playing this too often, making many children addicted.

Roblox is a sandbox, script with presents, a place where you can build your own game. Some developers create games that look exactly like casino, have roulette, slots, blackjack. Some games have mystery box mechanics, where you pay Robux (in game currency, purchased for fiat) to spin wheel or simply get box with random reward (such as skins or decorative items for character) with common to rare quality. Process is similar to opening boxes for counter strike 2 game.

[acroman08]

The main concern people have about this is that the majority of Roblox players are underage, and they are being exposed to gambling and possibly getting exploited, too.

Kids can't really distinguish harm and they are the most vulnerable. There I agree that they either fix this issue immediately or become completely banned.
Is this the case with Roblox in other countries were they are allowed? Why would they wait to be threatened with a ban before they address the issue. The companies do not really care about people except for them making profit.

True, children can't or have a hard time distinguishing harm, and they are also easy to coerce and manipulate, and that's the main concern the Philippine government had with Roblox.

The Philippine government is going to ban Roblox on April 3, and the Roblox execs are going to the Philippines to have a dialogue with local authorities, but there is news that they will still continue to ban it

April 3 is in two days, we wait for the latest news from them.

The deadline has been extended until April 10. Also, I just checked, and it looks like there is an update where the Philippine officials have laid out their non-negotiable demands, basically, they want Roblox to have a physical office in the Philippines, a very strict KYC(which I think is kind of ridiculous), and they want Roblox to provide to necessary information to track down predators and cybercriminals operating inside the game. They want Roblox to put a structural "safety by design" feature, the feature includes a "rapid-response reporting hotline" to report predatory behavior, and they also want "context-based filtering" that detects and blocks grooming behaviors.

If you want to read their full demands(not just the non-negotiable ones), you can read this article https://bitpinas.com/fintech/ph-roblox-demands/#demanding-safety-by-design

[Russlenat]

The deadline has been extended until April 10. Also, I just checked, and it looks like there is an update where the Philippine officials have laid out their non-negotiable demands, basically, they want Roblox to have a physical office in the Philippines, a very strict KYC(which I think is kind of ridiculous), and they want Roblox to provide to necessary information to track down predators and cybercriminals operating inside the game. They want Roblox to put a structural "safety by design" feature, the feature includes a "rapid-response reporting hotline" to report predatory behavior, and they also want "context-based filtering" that detects and blocks grooming behaviors.

If you want to read their full demands(not just the non-negotiable ones), you can read this article https://bitpinas.com/fintech/ph-roblox-demands/#demanding-safety-by-design

If they can ban Binance in the Philippines, then it’s even more possible for them to ban this one. Without a local office, they can’t collect taxes, so there’s really no reason for them to allow users to keep playing. But honestly, most of the time it just stays as an announcement and the implementation isn’t that strict. ISPs might block the website, but kids these days are not that easy to stop. They already know how to bypass restrictions using VPNs or even simple DNS tricks.

So even if it gets blocked, many users will still find a way to access it.

[Satofan44]

The main concern of the government is that Roblox games facilitate gambling. It is a problem because many users are children who shouldn't be exposed to gambling.

That is only the outrage reasoning that brought this situation to the public light. There are many things wrong with Roblox games and children are not benefiting from them in any way.

The management of Roblox should liaise with the government and sort out the problem if they cherish the Philippine market.  

It is called empty compliance, they will make some basic changes, pay some bribes and the government will talk in public how a deal with great changes has been made.

I agree with the parents, it is true, if we let our children play roblox, most of them will change our children's personalities into what we do not expect. The real evidence that I see in my environment, children who play roblox more often defy their parents, some of them already have partners even though they are still underage, there are also quite a few cases where they dare to defy their parents because they want to top up in this game. It is very natural even if some countries limit this game, hopefully in the future it will help reduce children who have bad traits from this game.

Then simply don't let your children play Roblox? Surely you don't mean to imply that the government is supposed to wield the power to control children and what they do at home? It is the parents fault that children are able to get access to these games in the first place. Sure, the government could ban them but that does not mean that there is not going to be 100 other alternatives that the children will get access to. They may not be popular individually as much as Roblox was, but that fact won't diminish the negative impacts that it is going to have on the children that engage in such activities.

Based on the latest update, the Philippine government wants Roblox to have a local office in the Philippines so it can address people's concerns immediately as they arise. The local authorities have already stated all their demands its now up to the Roblox management if they are going to comply, so they can retain their presence. The Philippines has a large user base on Roblox. Let's see after April 10 if they can retain the Philippines as part of their platform.

GOVERNMENT WANTS ROBLOX PHYSICALLY PRESENT IN PH
Officials said the government expects Roblox representatives to engage directly with Philippine authorities, especially as the state seeks faster coordination in responding to threats involving minors.

Roblox warned: Fix child safety issues or face PH ban

Unless there is an extremely effective means of punishing them for failing to comply, establishing an office does not do much in terms of real change -- it just gives parents a place to rant and false pleasure from the belief that someone listened to them, even if they really did not.

[acroman08]

If anyone is still interested, there's an update.

From the looks of it, Roblox gave in to what the Philippine government wanted after being threatened with being banned from the country. From the article, it says that Roblox and the Philippine government announced new age-restricted account types and a direct reporting channel for child safety concerns.

Here's a snippet from the article showing what Roblox will implement on its platform.

Following weeks of regulatory scrutiny and threats of a nationwide ban, gaming platform Roblox and Philippine government agencies have issued a joint statement announcing the rollout of new age-restricted account types and a direct reporting channel for child safety concerns.

The April 14, 2026 statement, issued collaboratively by Roblox, the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), and the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC), outlines the implementation of “Roblox Kids” and “Roblox Select” accounts. The platform will automatically assign these account types to younger users based on mandatory age checks.

Roblox Kids
According to the global guidelines, the “Roblox Kids” account will be assigned to children aged 5 to 8. Under this tier, in-game chat is disabled by default, and access is restricted to games with “Minimal” or “Mild” content maturity ratings.

Roblox Select
Users aged 9 to 15 will be placed in a “Roblox Select” account. This tier grants access to games with up to a “Moderate” rating. While chat functionalities are available, they are filtered and restricted to communication with users of similar ages and those added as Trusted Friends.

Roblox is also expanding its suite of parental controls. The update will allow parents to manually block specific games, approve access to restricted games, and manage direct chat settings for children up to age 15.

[aioc]

If anyone is still interested, there's an update.

From the looks of it, Roblox gave in to what the Philippine government wanted after being threatened with being banned from the country. From the article, it says that Roblox and the Philippine government announced new age-restricted account types and a direct reporting channel for child safety concerns.

The Philippines has a huge userbase, and its profit wise not lose that huge market. They did not offer this to other countries with similar complaints. Roblox should implement this for all its users. regardless of the country.
Those features should have been laid long ago; it has grown into a dangerous platform for kids, and its developers did not do anything until today.

[acroman08]

The Philippines has a huge userbase, and its profit wise not lose that huge market. They did not offer this to other countries with similar complaints. Roblox should implement this for all its users. regardless of the country.
Those features should have been laid long ago; it has grown into a dangerous platform for kids, and its developers did not do anything until today.

I completely agree with this. They should have implemented this system, or maybe something similar to it, long ago, without being asked or threatened to be banned by a country. Anyway, at least they followed what the Philippine government demanded from them. Hopefully, more countries will demand stricter child safety measures from Roblox.

[Hispo]

It reminds me other historical cases in which innocent games, which were intended to be free open multiplayer experiences for the young were turned into casinos. The most obvious would.be Habbo hotel,.a game for teen in which there were literal casinos sunning thanks to some random.number generator fuentes which allowed the owners of those objects to basically run their own gambling business.

It is similar to what is going on with Roblox, but on a bigger escale and with more people under the game of 18 being I troduced to gambling...

[TedMosby]

I myself have never played Roblox but don't know how there is a gambling mechanism there, maybe some kind of bet made by individuals? Roblox has now been mastered by many children because they see influencers playing this too often, making many children addicted.

Roblox is a sandbox, script with presents, a place where you can build your own game. Some developers create games that look exactly like casino, have roulette, slots, blackjack. Some games have mystery box mechanics, where you pay Robux (in game currency, purchased for fiat) to spin wheel or simply get box with random reward (such as skins or decorative items for character) with common to rare quality. Process is similar to opening boxes for counter strike 2 game.

IMO, it's a good application, just in the wrong place in that case.

Your post and this thread should be enough to answer pixipunks’ question about Why aren't social casinos an actual social casino?

I was thinking of Roblox and Gather to answer that question here:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5578947.msg66569990#msg66569990

For me, casino in Roblox is a good example for online social gambling purposes. Maybe an online casino can create a private server with age restrictions. So, people can gamble while socializing or vice versa.

[TopTort777]

If anyone is still interested, there's an update.

From the looks of it, Roblox gave in to what the Philippine government wanted after being threatened with being banned from the country. From the article, it says that Roblox and the Philippine government announced new age-restricted account types and a direct reporting channel for child safety concerns.

Here's a snippet from the article showing what Roblox will implement on its platform.

Following weeks of regulatory scrutiny and threats of a nationwide ban, gaming platform Roblox and Philippine government agencies have issued a joint statement announcing the rollout of new age-restricted account types and a direct reporting channel for child safety concerns.

The April 14, 2026 statement, issued collaboratively by Roblox, the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), and the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC), outlines the implementation of “Roblox Kids” and “Roblox Select” accounts. The platform will automatically assign these account types to younger users based on mandatory age checks.

Roblox Kids
According to the global guidelines, the “Roblox Kids” account will be assigned to children aged 5 to 8. Under this tier, in-game chat is disabled by default, and access is restricted to games with “Minimal” or “Mild” content maturity ratings.

Roblox Select
Users aged 9 to 15 will be placed in a “Roblox Select” account. This tier grants access to games with up to a “Moderate” rating. While chat functionalities are available, they are filtered and restricted to communication with users of similar ages and those added as Trusted Friends.

Roblox is also expanding its suite of parental controls. The update will allow parents to manually block specific games, approve access to restricted games, and manage direct chat settings for children up to age 15.

And how this is going to help if you can go to settings and change your birthday info? It is done with 1 click in settings. How is it going to help if there is almost no moderation for released games (by looking what games are available, I would say no one even care to check what is game about). If you are game dev, you can create gambling game and mark that it is for kids 5 to 8. Roblox has created something, but for everything still parents are responsible for.

[Taskford]

The Philippines has a huge userbase, and its profit wise not lose that huge market. They did not offer this to other countries with similar complaints. Roblox should implement this for all its users. regardless of the country.
Those features should have been laid long ago; it has grown into a dangerous platform for kids, and its developers did not do anything until today.

I completely agree with this. They should have implemented this system, or maybe something similar to it, long ago, without being asked or threatened to be banned by a country. Anyway, at least they followed what the Philippine government demanded from them. Hopefully, more countries will demand stricter child safety measures from Roblox.

Maybe they are to confident before that Philippines government will not bother their operation, but guess serious concerns arise when kids are slowly been introduce to many disturbing practices.

I don't know since I didn't get an update regarding on this case, but its good if they really made some good actions to comply what government wants to happen.

But still Roblox is good application on where kids could play, but devs really need to protect them to avoid exploitation and other abuses.

[Betwrong]

Roblox is under investigation in the Philippines for having games similar to gambling. Just so people know, this isn't the first time Roblox has come under investigation because of games that resemble gambling. I remember discussions about it in the past where it talks about people filing a complaint that there are games inside Roblox that are basically a casino, where players can gamble. The main concern people have about this is that the majority of Roblox players are underage, and they are being exposed to gambling and possibly getting exploited, too.

Exposing underage audience to gambling is unacceptable. I don't know about Roblox much, but if they are doing this,  Philippines are doing a great job investigating them.Even without real money involved, I don’t think it’s a good idea to teach kids those games.

[Oasisman]

If anyone is still interested, there's an update.

From the looks of it, Roblox gave in to what the Philippine government wanted after being threatened with being banned from the country. From the article, it says that Roblox and the Philippine government announced new age-restricted account types and a direct reporting channel for child safety concerns.

Here's a snippet from the article showing what Roblox will implement on its platform.

Following weeks of regulatory scrutiny and threats of a nationwide ban, gaming platform Roblox and Philippine government agencies have issued a joint statement announcing the rollout of new age-restricted account types and a direct reporting channel for child safety concerns.

The April 14, 2026 statement, issued collaboratively by Roblox, the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), and the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC), outlines the implementation of “Roblox Kids” and “Roblox Select” accounts. The platform will automatically assign these account types to younger users based on mandatory age checks.

Roblox Kids
According to the global guidelines, the “Roblox Kids” account will be assigned to children aged 5 to 8. Under this tier, in-game chat is disabled by default, and access is restricted to games with “Minimal” or “Mild” content maturity ratings.

Roblox Select
Users aged 9 to 15 will be placed in a “Roblox Select” account. This tier grants access to games with up to a “Moderate” rating. While chat functionalities are available, they are filtered and restricted to communication with users of similar ages and those added as Trusted Friends.

Roblox is also expanding its suite of parental controls. The update will allow parents to manually block specific games, approve access to restricted games, and manage direct chat settings for children up to age 15.

And how this is going to help if you can go to settings and change your birthday info? It is done with 1 click in settings. How is it going to help if there is almost no moderation for released games (by looking what games are available, I would say no one even care to check what is game about). If you are game dev, you can create gambling game and mark that it is for kids 5 to 8. Roblox has created something, but for everything still parents are responsible for.

Same thoughts. Roblox doesn't have strict implementation of verifying the age of the person behind the account. A simple tweak from the settings would by-pass all these. Not unless if they will create a different launcher/server intended for children in such age brackets. But, stil, just like you said, the parents are still responsible if the children are following this protocol. I'm afraid kids these days knows much about internet and how to avoid things they're prohibited of. We've seen the kind of evil in the real world, but most of us don't know what kind of evil lies deep down the internet.

[coinrifft]

The Philippines has a huge userbase, and its profit wise not lose that huge market. They did not offer this to other countries with similar complaints. Roblox should implement this for all its users. regardless of the country.
Those features should have been laid long ago; it has grown into a dangerous platform for kids, and its developers did not do anything until today.

I completely agree with this. They should have implemented this system, or maybe something similar to it, long ago, without being asked or threatened to be banned by a country. Anyway, at least they followed what the Philippine government demanded from them. Hopefully, more countries will demand stricter child safety measures from Roblox.

Maybe they are to confident before that Philippines government will not bother their operation, but guess serious concerns arise when kids are slowly been introduce to many disturbing practices.

I don't know since I didn't get an update regarding on this case, but its good if they really made some good actions to comply what government wants to happen.

But still Roblox is good application on where kids could play, but devs really need to protect them to avoid exploitation and other abuses.

Roblox was good in the beginning, hence that's why it captured a lot of audience not just for kids, but for some who developed games inside Roblox and for sure they could have been making money out of it. But we all know that sooner or later it will be polluted by some people who might want to take advantage of this platform. That's why in the last couple of years it also become a very dangerous apps for young kids as there are a lot of pedos or gambling per se flying under the radar. But it's good to hear that our country is doing their job to at least curb the enthusiasm of gamblers and any other bad elements.

[bubilas]

Roblox is under investigation in the Philippines for having games similar to gambling. Just so people know, this isn't the first time Roblox has come under investigation because of games that resemble gambling. I remember discussions about it in the past where it talks about people filing a complaint that there are games inside Roblox that are basically a casino, where players can gamble. The main concern people have about this is that the majority of Roblox players are underage, and they are being exposed to gambling and possibly getting exploited, too.

The Philippine National Police’s (PNP) Chief General, Jose Melencio Nartatez Jr., has ordered the Anti-Cybercrime Group to improve efforts and investigations into criminal activity conducted in online gaming apps like Roblox.

The Philippine National Police has announced plans to work with the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) and the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Centre (CICC) to better target the crimes.

Nartatez Jr. stressed:

“Our mandate of serving and protecting the people now encompasses cyberspace to keep them safe, especially for children. The PNP is coordinating with other agencies to investigate the extent to which Roblox may be used for possible crimes, including sexual predation, grooming, and exploitation of minors.”

Roblox data shows that the game has 111 million daily users, of which around 40% are under the age of 13. The game’s Terms and Conditions state that gambling content is allowed on the platform, but actual gambling isn’t permitted.

However, the game has been under investigation for some time now, as authorities have found that it offers randomized rewards as well as loot box-style prizes and uses in-game currencies that are similar to gambling mechanisms.

The concerns increased after the Danish Gambling Authority (DGA) found in 2025 that Roblox’s in-game currency, Robux, can be used as a deposit in betting and casino games by third-party websites.

I've been playing Roblox for a while and I know this game very well. It has a sandbox mode where everyone can create their own maps and games inside them with absolutely any algorithms. Many game studios have received a lot of money from roblox for good game cards. But what if the card creator makes a casino inside? Of course, I've already thought about this and it's dangerous for children because there is a donation in the game, and if someone adds chances of luck and good luck, then this will become a really ready online casino for children.

[Fredomago]

The Philippines has a huge userbase, and its profit wise not lose that huge market. They did not offer this to other countries with similar complaints. Roblox should implement this for all its users. regardless of the country.
Those features should have been laid long ago; it has grown into a dangerous platform for kids, and its developers did not do anything until today.

I completely agree with this. They should have implemented this system, or maybe something similar to it, long ago, without being asked or threatened to be banned by a country. Anyway, at least they followed what the Philippine government demanded from them. Hopefully, more countries will demand stricter child safety measures from Roblox.

Yup, they don't want to lose that huge amounts of users as it really converted to decent amount of profits, but similar to what both of you said it's been a long delay as we see that they can do it if they are really concern about those young users, now that they being threathen we see that they act as soon as possible keeping their access to those users and not to lose their capabilities to continue their business.

[suzanne5223]

It reminds me other historical cases in which innocent games, which were intended to be free open multiplayer experiences for the young were turned into casinos. The most obvious would.be Habbo hotel,.a game for teen in which there were literal casinos sunning thanks to some random.number generator fuentes which allowed the owners of those objects to basically run their own gambling business.

It is similar to what is going on with Roblox, but on a bigger escale and with more people under the game of 18 being I troduced to gambling...

Agreed with what you and I honestly believe Roblox needs to modify their gaming services or maybe caution their game creator who could be the cause of all this to prevent the ban of their services in some countries just like Polymarket was banned in some countries for not following rules and regulations.
Having said that, I believe there are other settings that people need to pay attention to either due to the free access of minors to the internet because also of misdirection video, posts are online and it's introducing minors to things that will affect them in the future.