According to a report, several websites not associated directly with Roblox allow children to take their Robux—the in-game currency—and gamble it away in “a variety of luck-based casino and head-to-head games.”
The report comes from the Sharpr newsletter, which covers the intersection of e-sports and betting, where journalist Cody Luongo claims that there are “a handful of black market casino sites aggressively targeting the franchise’s youthful audience and facilitating illegal gambling services.” Those sites include ones like BloxFlip, RBXFlip, RBXLWild, and RBXGold, where users can attach their Roblox account in order to transfer the game’s in-game currency, Robux, and then gamble them away.
While these sites have no direct connection to the game itself, they have found a way to get into people’s accounts in this fashion, with no attempt to verify the age of the users, opening up children to incredibly predatory practices, especially considering 62% of Roblox users are under the age of 16. One of the sites in particular, BloxFlip, has even reportedly been caught offering Discord server titles to anyone willing to bet one million Robux (the real-money equivalent to $12,500), as well as giving sponsorship deals to Roblox influencers—offering them a cut of their follower’s lost money.
The owner of a third-party Roblox trading site, who spoke to Sharpr anonymously, stated in the report that “like 90% of the people promoting are underage, and it’s not even difficult to figure that out just based on the type of content they put out. These gambling sites don’t do any due diligence in asking for the age of the people they’re promoting with.”
A spokesperson for Roblox Corporation had this to say when asked about the Sharpr report:
“Bad actors make illegal use of Roblox’s intellectual property and branding to operate such sites in violation of our standards. Roblox has teams and processes in place to investigate these websites to protect our brand and platform, including, where possible, having the websites removed. In some cases, we engage with law enforcement as part of our efforts.”
While there’s currently been no word on if Roblox has decided to step in on the websites cited in the report, it seems there’s enough evidence that the company will have to do something in order to protect the youth being preyed on—seemingly on purpose in some of these cases. Hopefully, a resolution comes from Roblox Corporation fast in order to disallow these actions in the future.
