“The mother of a 15-year-old boy from California Rebecka Dallas initiated a lawsuit against Roblox and Discord. She argues that their “irresponsible and misleading” actions led to sexual exploitation and, as a consequence, the death of her son.”, – WRITE: www.pravda.com.ua
Source: NBC News
Details: The lawsuit filed with the San Francisco County, describes the tragic story of Itan Dallas, which is described as “a smart, creative guy who loved games, stinging and communicating with friends online.” He began to use the Roblox platform at the age of 9 with the permission of parents and with parental control.
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According to lawyers, at the age of 12, Andan became a victim of an “adult sexual predator” who gave himself for a child. Innocent conversations gradually grew into discussion of sexual topics and exchange of frank content.
Subsequently, the attacker convinced the guy to turn off the parental control and go for further communication to the Discord platform. There he “increasingly demanded candid photos and videos”, and later began to threaten them.
“Unfortunately, Ethan suffered irreversible suffering from this experience and committed suicide at the age of 15,” the claim said. According to the obituary, the teenager died in April 2024.
The claim contains accusations of causing death from negligence, fraud, misleading and failure to comply with user security. The main argument is that if Roblox and Discord were implemented by proper security measures, such as age and person, tragedy could be avoided.
The deceased’s mother claims that she considered platforms safe for her child, relying on their own statements and setting up parental control. However, as stated in the claim, Roblox allowed Itan to disable parental control independently, and Discord-to create an account and communicate with adults without any supervision.
After the death of her son, the family learned from the police that the man who was inclined was arrested in Florida for similar crimes against other children committed through the same platforms.
ROBLOX, which is used by 111 million users daily, has no minimal age restriction and does not require check -in when registering. Although the company states that children need to obtain parents’ permission, nothing prevents them from creating accounts on their own. In response to the accusation, Roblox stressed that it has “rigid built -in security mechanisms” and constantly introduces new features to protect users.
Discord, popular with gamers, the communication platform also does not check the age and person of users. The company has settings to protect minors, including automatic scanning of messages for candid content. However, the claim states that the platform “overflowing with sexually frank content with the participation of children”. Discord stated that they did not comment on court cases, but emphasized their “deep devotion”.
Anapol Weiss’s law firm, which represents the interests of the mother of the dead boy, reported that it was a ninth similar claim against these companies. The situation has attracted the attention of other organizations. The National Sexual Operations Center included Roblox and Discord in its “dirty dozen” list for 2024, arguing that they contribute and make a profit from sexual exploitation.
In addition, the NBC News investigation in 2023 found 35 cases where adults were held accountable for discord crimes. In August, the Prosecutor General Luisiana also filed a lawsuit against Roblox, accusing the platform of creating a “ideal place for pedophiles” due to lack of proper security measures.