EU May Place Roblox and ChatGPT Under Its Strictest Platform Rules
The reported designation would require both services to assess systemic risks, open more data to regulators, and provide clearer information about moderation and advertising.
Roblox and ChatGPT could soon face the European Union’s strictest rules for online platforms. According to a Bloomberg report, both services are poised to join the EU Digital Services Act’s list of Very Large Online Platforms, or VLOPs.
The DSA uses a threshold of more than 45 million monthly users for the designation. Facebook, X, TikTok, WhatsApp, and YouTube are already on the list. Roblox and ChatGPT would have to meet a higher level of transparency and oversight if the European Commission formally adds them.
What the VLOP rules would require
The European Commission and both companies declined to comment to Bloomberg. If the designation moves forward, Roblox and OpenAI would need to provide contact points for users and authorities, report criminal offenses, and write terms and conditions that are easier to understand.
The services would also have to explain more about their advertising, recommender systems, and content moderation decisions. The European Commission’s VLOP guidance says the platforms must identify and assess risks connected to:
- Illegal content
- Fundamental rights, including freedom of expression, media freedom, discrimination, consumer protection, and children’s rights
- Public security and electoral processes
- Gender-based violence, public health, protections for minors, and mental and physical wellbeing
Identifying those risks would not be the end of the process. The companies would also have to take steps to reduce them, which could include changes to how their services work or how their recommendation systems operate.
Other obligations would include an internal compliance team, independent audits at least once a year, and data sharing with the European Commission and national authorities. Vetted researchers would receive access to platform data when their work helps study risks in the EU. Users would also need a recommender-system option that does not rely on personal profiling, while each platform would have to maintain a public advertising repository.
Roblox already faces scrutiny over child safety
For Roblox, the possible VLOP designation would add European oversight to pressure the platform already faces over child safety. The company has been criticized over the risk of children encountering adults and inappropriate material, while regulators and lawmakers in several countries have examined how Roblox handles communication and moderation.
Roblox has also begun adding stronger age checks for chat access. Its facial age-estimation rollout is intended to determine whether users meet the required age for communication features, with the company saying the submitted images and videos are deleted after processing. The move was covered in a report on Roblox’s chat age checks.
The EU’s approach has already faced a real-world test with X. The platform received the VLOP designation in 2023 and was later investigated over transparency and moderation concerns. The EU imposed a $140 million fine, which X appealed. That case leaves an open question about how much practical pressure the rules will place on Roblox and ChatGPT if they join the same group.
For now, neither platform has confirmed that it will receive the designation. The reported move would still put both companies on notice that user safety, advertising, recommendation systems, and access to platform data will receive closer attention from EU authorities.
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Roblox
Developed by Roblox Corporation
Roblox is a massively multiplayer online platform marketed toward creators and players of all ages. It allows users to create their own virtual games using a variety of objects, which they and others can enter and socialize in. Games created on Roblox can be scripted using a sandboxed scripting language based on Lua 5.1 to affect events that occur in-game and create different scenarios.
- Genre: Platform, Simulator, Adventure
- Platforms: Meta Quest 2, PlayStation 4, Android, PC (Microsoft Windows), iOS, Meta Quest 3, PlayStation 5, Mac, Xbox One
- Perspective: First person, Third person, Virtual Reality
- Modes: Single player, Multiplayer, Co-operative
- Release: 2006-09-01
- Publisher: Roblox Corporation
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Age Rating:
- IGDB Rating: 70.9/100
