Roblox Faces Class Action for Alleged Claims of Enabling Child Gambling

Audet & Partners, LLP is currently involved in a class action lawsuit in the Northern District of California against Roblox, alleging the platform of illegally enabling child gambling. Roblox is one of the largest and fastest growing gaming platforms in the world, designed to bring users together in a virtual universe. It is a free online gaming platform that allows users to interact with one another, play games, and purchase items inside the Roblox virtual universe. Roblox allows users to make purchases of virtual items to be used in games or apps within the Roblox ecosystem. These purchases can be made with Roblox’s digital currency, called Robux. Despite Roblox’s policy against gambling, the lawsuit alleges that third-party sites utilize Roblox’s virtual currency, Robux, to conduct games of chance like blackjack and slots, targeting the platform’s primary audience of children and teens. The lawsuit names separate defendants, known as the Gambling Website Defendants, RBXFlip, Bloxflip, and RBLXWild as key offenders in what it describes as “an illegal gambling operation preying on children nationwide,” accusing Roblox of complicity through its control over Robux flow and profiting from transactions. Roblox, asserting that these gambling sites misuse its intellectual property and brand, claims to actively combat such practices, although the effectiveness of these efforts and their adherence to Roblox’s terms of service is under alleged scrutiny. The lawsuit challenges Roblox’s portrayal of its platform and currency as safe, alleging a failure to protect users from off-platform gambling sites exploiting Roblox’s ecosystem.