Roblox to require facial scans for children under 16 in Indonesia due to new social media rules

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Roblox, a gaming platform popular with kids, announced Thursday that children under 16 in Indonesia will be required to undergo facial scans to verify their age to comply with new restrictions on minors' use of social media and digital platforms in the country.

Nicky Jackson Colaco, Roblox’s vice president and global head of public policy, announced the changes in a press conference in Jakarta, describing them among the strictest that the company has implemented anywhere in the world.

She said the company has introduced tailored, age-based accounts in Indonesia: Roblox Kids for ages 5 to 12 with no chat features and Roblox Select for ages 13 to 15, with chat features limited to parents or approved family and friends.

The rollout involves automatically transitioning the 23 million accounts that identified as belonging to users under 16 by implementing age verification through facial scanning.

“Any user in Indonesia who has not used that tool, who has no facial age estimated, will be automatically placed in a Roblox Kids account and will not have access to chat," the Roblox executive said.

The age verification tool requires players to take a video selfie that will be used to estimate their age. Jackson Colaco said the date would be immediately deleted. “We don't keep anything,” she said.

The number of Roblox users in Indonesia has reached approximately 45 million, with about 23 million of them being children, said Communication and Digital Affairs Minister Meutya Hafid.

Roblox was the only gaming platform classified as high-risk by the Indonesian government, and its access restrictions for children differ from those of other social media platforms.

In addition to account categories and interactions based on age, the interactive gaming platform will also categorize the types of games played by age. The government regulations have prompted Roblox to limit usage time in the hope of reducing children’s addiction to the platform.

“To address concerns about addiction, screen time limits are now in place. Parents can set specific times or hours for their children to play games,” Hafid said.

Indonesia began implementing a new government regulation at the end of March banning children younger than 16 from accessing digital platforms that could expose them to addiction, pornography, online scams and cyberbullying.

Seven of the eight platforms classified as high-risk, including YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, Bigo Live, have committed to restricting children’s access to their services.

In addition to restricting access based on age, Indonesia is urging social media companies and digital platforms to report the number of accounts that have been suspended as part of the implementation of government regulations restricting access for children.