For many parents, online gaming looks like children building worlds, playing with friends and having fun.
But those same spaces can expose children to grooming, sexual exploitation and violent extremist material.
A new eSafety report has identified uneven protections across the companies behind Roblox, Minecraft, Fortnite and Steam.
Some safeguards have improved. Significant shortcomings remain.
My view is that companies providing these spaces have a responsibility to make safety part of their design.
Parents have responsibilities, too. But expecting every parent to understand every chat function, private server and reporting system is unrealistic.
And a warning buried in the settings offers little protection if children can easily encounter dangerous adults.
The political challenge is deciding what effective regulation looks like.
There’s a temptation to reach for the biggest announcement: another restriction, another ban, another promise to get tough.
But the measure of success should be whether children are safer when they actually use these services.
That means safer communication settings, reliable ways to report abuse, prompt responses from trained staff, and systems that prevent repeat offenders from simply opening another account.
Age checks may help. They also need to protect privacy. Collecting more sensitive information creates risks of its own.
Companies should have to demonstrate that their safeguards work, with scrutiny beyond their own assurances.
There’s also a leadership question. Commissioner Julie Inman Grant has indicated it may be time for new leadership after a decade in the role.
That signals a possible transition, rather than a confirmed departure. Whoever leads the regulator next will need technical expertise, independence and the capacity to enforce the rules.
Government should support that work while ensuring the regulator remains accountable for its decisions.
Gaming can be creative, social and rewarding. Those benefits deserve protection.
The goal should be to make the places children already enjoy safer.
Because a company’s commitment to child safety means very little until its systems can detect danger, and act before a child is harmed.
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