Roblox announced, this Friday (9) of January 2026, the global expansion of its mandatory age verification policy for all users who wish to access the chat function within the platform. This move, which was already being tested in countries such as the United Kingdom and Australia, now becomes a rule for all regions where the feature is available, including Brazil. Therefore, from now on, anyone who wants to chat with other players will first need to confirm their age range through a secure process. In this way, the company positions itself as the first major online gaming platform to adopt this measure for users of all ages, marking a significant investment in digital security.
The main objective of the measure is to create proactive age-based barriers, limiting communication between adults and minors. To implement this change, Roblox uses the service of the company Persona, which processes the data privately and deletes it immediately after verification. As a result of this process, players are distributed into six different age groups, and standard communication is restricted to adjacent ranges. This means, for example, that a 9-year-old child will not be able to chat with someone over 13 years old, while a 16-year-old teenager will have access to chats with users between 13 and 20 years old.
How the new security barrier works
The verification, although described as voluntary, is in practice a mandatory requirement for those who wish to use the chat. Without completing it, the player simply does not have access to the function. Furthermore, Roblox states that it will constantly monitor user behavior to identify possible inconsistencies. If someone is flagged for acting significantly differently than expected for their confirmed age range, they will be asked to repeat the verification process. This extra layer seeks to increase the effectiveness of the initial barrier and make age falsification more difficult.
Since the beginning of the tests, over 50% of daily active users in the pilot countries have already completed the verification. Matt Kaufman, Roblox’s security director, reinforced the company’s commitment, stating that the goal is to deliver the highest possible level of protection. This is not the first action of its kind, as in November 2024 the platform had already restricted access to direct messages for users under 13. With this global expansion, Roblox hopes to establish a new standard for safe communication in online gaming environments, a topic of extreme relevance for parents and guardians in Brazil and around the world.
