Online games can conceal all sorts of things. For example, back in 2020 a 12 year old allegedly received this message in a chat on the Roblox online platform:
“You’re 12, I expect you to be a little slow on the upbringing, but soon I’ll corrupt you beyond your wildest dreams.”
This chat message wasn’t from another 12 year old, but reportedly from an adult man known in Roblox as “Doc,” with the purported legal name of Jadon Shedletsky. “Doc” was known to have made similar comments publicly, such as self-referencing as “the old man with kids in his basement.”
But “Doc” wasn’t Jadon Shedletsky. He was in reality Arnold Castillo, and several years later was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to Transportation of a Minor with Intent to Engage in Criminal Sexual Activity and Coercion and Enticement of a Minor. In additon to Roblox, Castillo used Discord and Instagram to communicate with the girl, and Uber for the “transportation of a minor” part.
Understandbly Roblox and the parents of Roblox’s youthful users don’t want the kids to strike up chats with people like Castillo. So Roblox is limiting chats between young kids and adults.
“[O]ur age check requirement to chat, which launched in select regions in early December, is rolling out globally wherever chat is available. Users in the U.S. and select regions will see in-app prompts asking them to complete an age check to chat with others. Over the next week, these prompts will roll out to all regions where chat is available.”
But how do you enforce such rules when kids normally don’t have identification?
According to Biometric Update, with age estimation.
“Roblox uses facial age estimation (FAE) technology from Persona for its Trusted Connections feature, which requires users to do an age check before they can interact with others on the platform….
“The technology used by our vendor, Persona, has been tested and certified by third-party laboratories. The age estimation models used achieved a Mean Absolute Error of 1.4 years for users younger than 18, based on testing by the Age Check Certification Scheme in the UK.”
There are differences between age verification and age estimation, but there are also times when you can only use one or the other.
As biometric product marketing experts know.
Bredemarket 