# Roblox Exclusive with Matt Kaufman

An episode of [Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1082244480), 19 May 2026, 22 min.

Audio: https://mgln.ai/e/187/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/fa326977-3de5-4283-9b8b-af3500c58607/b69b2795-5503-4de1-ac91-af460017906e/09446096-ba96-4fda-8904-b44800c6ff86/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=a05f1702-0c0e-4b0f-8014-af460017907c

After years of criticism around child safety, Roblox is rolling out major changes designed to better protect kids online — and this podcast has the exclusive Australian interview. Justin talks directly with Roblox Chief Safety Officer Matt Kaufman about the platform’s new age-based accounts, facial age checks, tighter content moderation, chat restrictions, and updated parental controls. Can parents finally trust Roblox? What risks still remain? And how involved do parents really need to be? This conversation unpacks what’s changing, what parents should know, and why online safety can never be fully outsourced to technology alone. KEY POINTS • Roblox is introducing separate accounts for kids under 9, ages 9–15, and users 16+ • Younger users will have heavily restricted chat and content access • Facial age estimation technology will be used to verify ages • Roblox says content moderation now combines AI with human review • Parents will gain more control over chat, content, and account settings • Justin challenges Roblox on past failures and broken trust with families • The biggest safety tool still isn’t technology — it’s parental involvement QUOTE OF THE EPISODE “Parents shouldn’t have to be constantly involved. The platforms have a responsibility.” RESOURCES • #761 - Game… or Off? Are Video Games Really That Bad? • #1261 - Hooked on Games: How to Help Kids Break Free from Addictive Gaming (feat. Scott Novus, former VP at Disney & gaming expert) • The Screen Smart Series (Webinar) ACTION STEPS FOR PARENTS • Review your child’s Roblox settings and parental controls together • Talk regularly about who they’re chatting and gaming with online • Make sure your child’s age is set up correctly on their account • Keep devices in shared family spaces where possible • Treat online safety as an ongoing conversation, not a one-time setup See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:06] Speaker 1: After months impression from the Esactor Commissioner, gaming platform, Roadblocks
[0:09] Speaker 1: is today announcing fresh changes to make it services safer
[0:13] Speaker 1: for kids. You an exclusive interview for podcasts in Australia
[0:16] Speaker 1: today on the Happy Families podcast. There are massive changes
[0:20] Speaker 1: coming to Roadblocks as they continue their work in telling
[0:24] Speaker 1: us that they're making the platform safe for children and
[0:27] Speaker 1: young people. I've been offered an exclusive opportunity to have
[0:30] Speaker 1: a conversation with Roadblocks's chief safety officer. His name is
[0:35] Speaker 1: Matt Kaufman. Matt and I are going to be talking
[0:37] Speaker 1: next about the changes, what they mean for our kids,
[0:40] Speaker 1: whether or not Roadblocks can be trusted with these changes,
[0:43] Speaker 1: and how you can work with Roadblocks and your child
[0:46] Speaker 1: to give them a safe online experience assuming that you're
[0:50] Speaker 1: letting them use Roadblocks. Like I said, this is the
[0:52] Speaker 1: only podcast conversation where Matt is speaking to somebody in
[0:56] Speaker 1: Australia about this. We've got the exclusive here at Happy
[0:58] Speaker 1: Families and that discussion is next. Gooday, Welcome to the
[1:05] Speaker 1: Happy Families podcast today, a podcast exclusive in Australia, a
[1:09] Speaker 1: conversation with Matt Kaufman. Matt Kaufman has served as the
[1:12] Speaker 1: chief safety officer at Roblock Since twenty twenty three. He
[1:16] Speaker 1: leads the company's safety and civility efforts across product and
[1:19] Speaker 1: operations and policy. First joined Roadblocks in twenty seventeen as
[1:23] Speaker 1: VP of Product and Operations and since then has continued
[1:26] Speaker 1: his work with Roblocks. Knows his stuff. Holds a degree
[1:30] Speaker 1: in Mechanical and Aeronautical engineering from University of California Davis
[1:34] Speaker 1: and master's in aerospace engineering from Virginia Tech. Before Roadblocks,
[1:39] Speaker 1: he worked at a senior roles in places like crunch, Base,
[1:42] Speaker 1: Urdle and the online virtual world there dot Com. That's
[1:46] Speaker 1: enough of the bio stuff, Matt Well, I really appreciate
[1:49] Speaker 1: you joining me for this conversation. Let's just talk through
[1:51] Speaker 1: the changes right now. There's a whole suite of changes
[1:54] Speaker 1: that Roadblocks is going to bring in specifically in Australia
[1:59] Speaker 1: as part of the revamped emphasis in Australia on children
[2:02] Speaker 1: being safe online. What can you tell us about these changes?
[2:06] Speaker 2: So, the frust change we're making is that we are
[2:10] Speaker 2: introducing a Roadblocks Kids accounts, and we're calling Roadblocks Select accounts.
[2:15] Speaker 2: Roadblocks Kids accounts are for anybody who is under nine,
[2:18] Speaker 2: and our Select accounts are for users who are between
[2:21] Speaker 2: nine and fifteen years old. And what these two accounts
[2:25] Speaker 2: types do is that it makes it easier for parents
[2:28] Speaker 2: to understand what their kids have access to on roadblocks.
[2:32] Speaker 2: So our existing standards for communication still apply. Kids under
[2:36] Speaker 2: nine can't communicate or car to anybody. As you get
[2:40] Speaker 2: older and you're in the nine plus, then you get
[2:43] Speaker 2: sort of added features to be able to talk to
[2:45] Speaker 2: your friends and others like that. And the other thing
[2:47] Speaker 2: is we're talking a lot more about the content you
[2:49] Speaker 2: have access to. So with Roadblocks Kids accounts and our
[2:53] Speaker 2: Roadblock Select accounts, the content you have access to is
[2:56] Speaker 2: the content that we have the highest confidence in, content
[3:01] Speaker 2: that has the right age ratings for those age groups.
[3:05] Speaker 2: And we are using age checks or a face to
[3:08] Speaker 2: age ustimation as one of the mechanisms for doing those
[3:10] Speaker 2: age checks to make sure that users get into the
[3:13] Speaker 2: rate accounts that are appropriate for them.
[3:15] Speaker 1: Matt, I'm going to link to the changes via the
[3:18] Speaker 1: Roadblocks website in the show notes. Two of the biggest
[3:22] Speaker 1: challenges that I've been quite noisy about when it comes
[3:26] Speaker 1: to children and their safety on roadblocks, and there are
[3:29] Speaker 1: more than just these two, but two of the biggest
[3:31] Speaker 1: challenges have been my concern around the content that kids
[3:36] Speaker 1: can see and their access to people that they don't know.
[3:40] Speaker 1: And when you were in Australia a couple of months
[3:42] Speaker 1: ago with David Bazooki, the CEO of Roadblocks, Yea, the
[3:45] Speaker 1: three of us got to sit down and have quite
[3:46] Speaker 1: a new depth conversation about what's going on there, which
[3:49] Speaker 1: was a real delight or problemised to be able to do.
[3:53] Speaker 1: It sounds to me like these changes are directly oriented
[3:57] Speaker 1: towards those areas before we go into them in more depth. Though,
[4:01] Speaker 1: the biggest question that I have is around age checking.
[4:05] Speaker 1: Now you've just hinted that age checking is an integral
[4:07] Speaker 1: part of this. If kids are going to be age
[4:09] Speaker 1: bracketed for you're nine and under, and then you're nine
[4:12] Speaker 1: to fifteen, and then fifteen and over, there has to
[4:14] Speaker 1: be an effective way to age check. The social media
[4:17] Speaker 1: companies are saying that it doesn't work, and I'm wondering
[4:21] Speaker 1: how confident you are in what Roadblocks is going to
[4:25] Speaker 1: be doing for age checking. And a follow up to
[4:28] Speaker 1: that is what happens when it gets it wrong.
[4:30] Speaker 2: I guess I want to start with saying that Roadblocks
[4:32] Speaker 2: and myself included we're optimistic that going through age checks
[4:37] Speaker 2: and using the camera in order to estimate your age.
[4:40] Speaker 2: We're confident in that in being a highly accessible, global
[4:45] Speaker 2: solution that we can offer that's very easy for users.
[4:49] Speaker 2: Is it perfect And the answer is no, But I
[4:52] Speaker 2: would argue that most things in life aren't perfect. Now
[4:56] Speaker 2: we know that for users who are under eighteen years,
[5:00] Speaker 2: the age check process, using a face to age estimation
[5:03] Speaker 2: gets people's ages right within about plus or minus one
[5:06] Speaker 2: point four years. And we know that from data. But
[5:09] Speaker 2: there's really two parts of age checking. There's part one
[5:13] Speaker 2: is determining whether the person on the other side of
[5:15] Speaker 2: the camera is a real person, whether like they're not
[5:18] Speaker 2: just somebody holding up their phone of their favorite celebrity
[5:22] Speaker 2: or showing a cartoon character, but is it a real person?
[5:25] Speaker 2: And then the second part of age check is taking
[5:28] Speaker 2: a face and converting it to an age. The second
[5:31] Speaker 2: part there's a lot of data we you know, scientific
[5:34] Speaker 2: data that shows under eighteen plus or minds one point
[5:36] Speaker 2: four years. We're confident in that the checking to see
[5:40] Speaker 2: if you're a real person is something that companies have
[5:43] Speaker 2: to devote a lot of energy to do. Roadblocks have
[5:46] Speaker 2: taken the approach that we care deeply that the person
[5:49] Speaker 2: on the other end of the camera is real and
[5:51] Speaker 2: we don't want people faking it, so we implement all
[5:54] Speaker 2: kinds of checks to make sure you're a real person.
[5:57] Speaker 2: I think what makes the age check process infusing out
[6:01] Speaker 2: there for parents is that there are lots of companies
[6:04] Speaker 2: doing this, lots of products and services doing it, but
[6:08] Speaker 2: not everybody takets that first step of making sure it's
[6:12] Speaker 2: a real person. Not everybody goes to the links that
[6:15] Speaker 2: say roadblocks does. Despite issues, it is categorically more effective
[6:23] Speaker 2: than simply asking somebody how old they are.
[6:25] Speaker 1: Matt, I hear what you're saying, and I hope that
[6:27] Speaker 1: you're right. Other than the photo, how do you know
[6:29] Speaker 1: that the ten year old who's saying that they're ten
[6:32] Speaker 1: is actually ten, and it's not a fifty year old
[6:34] Speaker 1: who is pretending to be ten and holding up a
[6:37] Speaker 1: photo of a child or bringing in their own child
[6:40] Speaker 1: and getting them to smile for the camera. What do
[6:43] Speaker 1: you have beyond the facial.
[6:45] Speaker 2: Recognition, the bringing in the photo thing, Because I think
[6:48] Speaker 2: this comes up a lot. I mean, it's sensational on
[6:51] Speaker 2: social media. Look, I held up a picture of my
[6:54] Speaker 2: dog and it said that I'm twenty five. But that's
[6:57] Speaker 2: not how it works, and that's not how roadblocks works.
[7:00] Speaker 2: So how do we tell The first thing is when
[7:02] Speaker 2: we take the picture of you and it's asking you
[7:04] Speaker 2: to move your head around, what people don't really realize
[7:07] Speaker 2: is what is actually doing is looking to see if
[7:09] Speaker 2: you have an ear. Because if you take a profile picture,
[7:12] Speaker 2: like I take your picture right now, Justin, and I
[7:14] Speaker 2: get a snapshot of it, and I'm I'm going to
[7:16] Speaker 2: be like, hey, I'm a kid, I'm going to go
[7:18] Speaker 2: use Justin's picture to like claim that I'm, you know,
[7:21] Speaker 2: you look older than twenty five. That I'm not going
[7:23] Speaker 2: to guess how old. I'm going to claim that I'm,
[7:25] Speaker 2: you know, an adult. I can't see your ears because
[7:28] Speaker 2: in the profile I can't see it. But when these
[7:30] Speaker 2: age check processes run and it's asking you to move
[7:32] Speaker 2: your head and you're following instructions, it's looking for these
[7:35] Speaker 2: basic signs of are you real person? And it you know,
[7:38] Speaker 2: there's lots of stuff that goes into that. The other
[7:40] Speaker 2: thing is, let's say that you know you're a kid
[7:44] Speaker 2: and you get your parent to do it on your behalf.
[7:46] Speaker 2: And that was actually something that we saw a lot of.
[7:48] Speaker 2: To be honest with you, is that I think kids
[7:51] Speaker 2: are so accustomed to getting an ask on their phone
[7:54] Speaker 2: to like verify some, verify this, verify that, and read
[7:58] Speaker 2: to this, rea to that. There are a lot of
[7:59] Speaker 2: kids hand the phone to their parents and say, hey,
[8:02] Speaker 2: do this for me, And I can't blame them. I mean,
[8:04] Speaker 2: I think we've trained kids that this is what you
[8:07] Speaker 2: should do, ask your parent. But the parent gets the phone,
[8:10] Speaker 2: they're taking care of lots of other things at the
[8:12] Speaker 2: same time. And we saw a lot of cases where
[8:15] Speaker 2: the parent are like, oh, wants to take a picture.
[8:16] Speaker 2: Here we go. It's just me and the parent didn't
[8:19] Speaker 2: realize they were setting the age for their kid. They
[8:22] Speaker 2: just didn't know. So we have ways of fixing that.
[8:26] Speaker 2: Parents can can create a verified parent account and they
[8:31] Speaker 2: can adjust the age of their kids. We allow parents
[8:34] Speaker 2: and kids to reset the process and start it over
[8:37] Speaker 2: again if they screwed up. We allow you to use
[8:40] Speaker 2: a photo ID if you want so. We have these
[8:43] Speaker 2: other mechanisms in there to correct it. Now. Not only
[8:46] Speaker 2: do we have that, but we also look at your
[8:49] Speaker 2: user behavior after you've gone through the age process, and
[8:53] Speaker 2: if we notice, like your behavior like what you're playing,
[8:56] Speaker 2: if you're talking to people, how you're talking to them,
[8:58] Speaker 2: things like that. If we notice that that looks indifferent
[9:01] Speaker 2: than what you age checked as well, asked you to
[9:04] Speaker 2: do the process again. So these are never like one
[9:07] Speaker 2: and done things, and that is how we think about
[9:09] Speaker 2: the age check crosses.
[9:19] Speaker 1: Matt Coffin has served as the Chief Safety Officer at
[9:21] Speaker 1: Roblock since twenty twenty three. He leads the company's safety
[9:25] Speaker 1: and civility efforts across product and operations and policy. Let's
[9:28] Speaker 1: talk about content classification. With the content classification, I presume
[9:34] Speaker 1: it's going to be done by technology by AI a
[9:37] Speaker 1: lot more than it's going to be done by people.
[9:38] Speaker 1: Will people be involved in both? And the reason that
[9:42] Speaker 1: I'm asking this is I'm sure that the word Hindenburg
[9:45] Speaker 1: is not one that's smiled on very much at Roadblocks
[9:47] Speaker 1: at the moment, but for people who missed it. A
[9:49] Speaker 1: couple of years ago, a group called Hindenburg Research published
[9:52] Speaker 1: a contested but scathing report on damaging allegations against Roadblocks.
[9:58] Speaker 3: When you talk about a platform with and eighty million
[10:01] Speaker 3: billly active users in that age group, there will be
[10:05] Speaker 3: concerns around child safety. I mean the content that they're consuming,
[10:08] Speaker 3: how much time they're spending, what kind of communities are
[10:12] Speaker 3: thriving on that platform. And I think that's what Hindenburg
[10:15] Speaker 3: is bringing into focus, that there isn't enough content safety.
[10:19] Speaker 1: And something that really stood out to me in the
[10:21] Speaker 1: Hindenburg research report showed that when they set up a
[10:24] Speaker 1: test account registers an eight year old, they were able
[10:27] Speaker 1: to access groups that were openly trading child sex abuse
[10:31] Speaker 1: materials simply by searching the word adult. So, in terms
[10:35] Speaker 1: of this best in the world moderation, obviously with the
[10:38] Speaker 1: age checking that's occurring now, there's still going to be
[10:42] Speaker 1: content that needs to be placed into the appropriate age group.
[10:46] Speaker 1: How is the content classification going to be done?
[10:49] Speaker 2: Oh, we do content clarification. There's actually two parts of it.
[10:52] Speaker 2: One there is moderation to say does the content meet
[10:55] Speaker 2: our standards. I mean, as somebody is doing something truly
[10:58] Speaker 2: in a faery, as they're you know, they're celebrating you know, terrorism,
[11:02] Speaker 2: or you know, they're doing anything that would endanger a child,
[11:05] Speaker 2: that is not allowed on our platform. It is against
[11:08] Speaker 2: our policies. Even if one person sees it or five
[11:11] Speaker 2: or ten or you know, out of you know, one
[11:13] Speaker 2: hundred plus million people who are on roadblocks every day.
[11:16] Speaker 2: It doesn't matter, it is not okay. So I just
[11:19] Speaker 2: want to start with that. Now. When we look at content,
[11:22] Speaker 2: first we decide is it acceptable on our platform or not?
[11:25] Speaker 2: And the second thing we decide is what are the
[11:29] Speaker 2: ratings associated with the content. We are working with ACB,
[11:34] Speaker 2: the Ratings Board in Australia, to apply their ratings to
[11:36] Speaker 2: our content, and we're going to be doing that in
[11:38] Speaker 2: the future. So there's two parts of it. We use
[11:42] Speaker 2: both humans looking at content, and we also use machines,
[11:46] Speaker 2: and so it's really it's a marriage of the two.
[11:49] Speaker 2: I don't think that you know entirely what AI are
[11:53] Speaker 2: entirely human. That is not the answer. The answer is
[11:55] Speaker 2: you have to use both. So I do want to
[11:58] Speaker 2: talk about the content that is accessible to our younger users,
[12:01] Speaker 2: our users who are under sixteen, or users who have
[12:04] Speaker 2: not gone through the age check process. If you choose
[12:07] Speaker 2: not to go through the age check process, no problem,
[12:09] Speaker 2: You'll just not have access to any content that it
[12:12] Speaker 2: would you know, our wider set of content, you'll be
[12:15] Speaker 2: limited to what our under sixteens have access to. One
[12:18] Speaker 2: of the things that we're doing is part of the
[12:20] Speaker 2: rollout of roadblocks kids and select is we're looking at
[12:24] Speaker 2: we're only making the content which we have the highest
[12:28] Speaker 2: confidence in available to our younger users. And so what
[12:32] Speaker 2: does that mean? The way I would describe it is,
[12:36] Speaker 2: let's imagine you buy a new house or you rent
[12:40] Speaker 2: a new apartment or condo. When you walk through it
[12:42] Speaker 2: right before you sign your name on it, you can
[12:45] Speaker 2: walk through and be like, hey, everything looks great. But
[12:48] Speaker 2: after you've lived in it for a little bit, you're like, wow,
[12:50] Speaker 2: you know that door doesn't actually shut all the way
[12:53] Speaker 2: and wow, like hot water it doesn't come out of
[12:55] Speaker 2: that faucet over there. It's not something you would have
[12:58] Speaker 2: seen when you walk through that house. And I think
[13:01] Speaker 2: what we're saying for our content where a large user
[13:03] Speaker 2: generated content platform is we want to make sure that
[13:06] Speaker 2: the content that we have available to our youngest users
[13:09] Speaker 2: has been sort of lived in for a while, that
[13:12] Speaker 2: it's been on the platform for a while, that we
[13:14] Speaker 2: know who the developer is, that it wasn't somebody who
[13:17] Speaker 2: just popped up yesterday and created content. We want to
[13:20] Speaker 2: have a high degree of confidence in who the developer is,
[13:23] Speaker 2: whether the content has been viewed by other people, adults,
[13:26] Speaker 2: older users, and whether people have flagged any issues, and
[13:29] Speaker 2: that all of our safety moderation systems, whether they're human
[13:32] Speaker 2: or automated, have had time to really look at that content.
[13:36] Speaker 2: So with the launch of Roadblocks Kids and Roadblocks Select accounts,
[13:39] Speaker 2: we're saying only the content that has gone through all
[13:42] Speaker 2: of these additional checks will be available to our younger users.
[13:46] Speaker 2: And I think that this is an important step for
[13:48] Speaker 2: Roadblocks because I think people have to, you know, remember,
[13:52] Speaker 2: and we need to recognize that we are a user
[13:55] Speaker 2: generated content platform. It's what makes Roadblocks amazing. The majority
[13:59] Speaker 2: of our top content was made by kids who started
[14:03] Speaker 2: playing on Roadblocks when they were much younger, and we
[14:05] Speaker 2: want to keep that ethos of a user generated content
[14:09] Speaker 2: platform where people are learning STEM skills and creating and
[14:12] Speaker 2: sharing with their friends. We want to maintain that while
[14:15] Speaker 2: also making sure that the content that's available to our
[14:17] Speaker 2: youngest users has passed through a bunch of safety checks
[14:22] Speaker 2: to make sure that we really understand the ratings of
[14:24] Speaker 2: it and that it does adhere to our content policies.
[14:29] Speaker 1: Matt, My last question around the changes relates to parental controls.
[14:32] Speaker 1: Last time all I signed up for an account on
[14:34] Speaker 1: roadblocks as a very very young person the parental controls
[14:38] Speaker 1: that were loose. Has anything changed there?
[14:42] Speaker 3: Yeah?
[14:43] Speaker 2: Well, I mean I would encourage you to sign up
[14:44] Speaker 2: as a parent now to see all of the stuff
[14:46] Speaker 2: that we've added over the last year or so, and
[14:49] Speaker 2: we continue to add things. Our goal is to make
[14:51] Speaker 2: the pronal controls as easy as possible for parents to use.
[14:55] Speaker 2: One thing I would note is that when we think
[14:58] Speaker 2: about parental controls, we obviously want to make it easy
[15:02] Speaker 2: for parents to tune who their kids are able to
[15:04] Speaker 2: talk to or not able to talk to it all,
[15:06] Speaker 2: but obviously our youngest users can't talk to anybody. We
[15:09] Speaker 2: want to make it easy for parents to decide what
[15:11] Speaker 2: content their kids have access to. Whether there's a piece
[15:14] Speaker 2: of content that maybe we didn't think it was appropriate
[15:17] Speaker 2: but the parents think it is, or vice versa, where
[15:19] Speaker 2: the parents are like, hey, I just disagree with this
[15:22] Speaker 2: type of content, I don't want my kid to have
[15:23] Speaker 2: access to it, and I want to turn that off. We
[15:25] Speaker 2: want to make that really easy, I would say, though,
[15:29] Speaker 2: and we invest a lot in this. The most important
[15:32] Speaker 2: thing for parents when it comes to parental controls is
[15:35] Speaker 2: to be engaged with their kid and just talk to
[15:38] Speaker 2: them about what they're doing. The most important parental control
[15:41] Speaker 2: doesn't require you to sign up or do anything. It's
[15:43] Speaker 2: just talking to your kid. It's talking to your kid
[15:46] Speaker 2: about like what games are you playing, who are you
[15:48] Speaker 2: playing those games with? Like what do you like about it?
[15:51] Speaker 2: Like what was exciting? What was something that you know
[15:54] Speaker 2: maybe you didn't like, and really having that conversation with kids.
[15:57] Speaker 2: And so when I think about where we're going with
[16:00] Speaker 2: paranal controls in the future, we're going to try and
[16:04] Speaker 2: do more to foster that conversation between parents and their
[16:07] Speaker 2: kids about what they're doing on roadblocks.
[16:11] Speaker 1: If I were to summarize everything that I think that
[16:13] Speaker 1: I've heard you say for parents who are saying, all right,
[16:14] Speaker 1: there's been a lot of information, I really just want
[16:16] Speaker 1: to get my head around exactly what this means. I'm
[16:19] Speaker 1: going to do my best to do a quick summary,
[16:21] Speaker 1: correct me if I'm wrong. So the first thing is
[16:24] Speaker 1: that there's now going to be three different types of
[16:26] Speaker 1: account rather than essentially what has been a singular roadblocks account.
[16:30] Speaker 1: There's going to be roadblocks kids for children age let's
[16:34] Speaker 1: say five to eight. Then there's going to be roadblocks
[16:37] Speaker 1: select which will be for nine to fifteen year olds,
[16:40] Speaker 1: and then there'll be the regular roadblocks account for children
[16:43] Speaker 1: sixteen and over age checking is going to happen primarily
[16:47] Speaker 1: using technology and verifying that a person is a real person.
[16:53] Speaker 1: One thing that has been threaded through this conversation, and
[16:55] Speaker 1: I feel like it's a slight contrast to the discussion
[16:58] Speaker 1: we had a couple of months ago when I met
[16:59] Speaker 1: you in the brisb And Hotel with David Buzuki was
[17:02] Speaker 1: and I might not be saying this word perfect, but
[17:04] Speaker 1: David said something along the lines of, we want roadblocks
[17:06] Speaker 1: to be a platform that parents can leave their kids
[17:08] Speaker 1: with without having to worry about what they're doing. We
[17:10] Speaker 1: want roadblocks to be safe for kids without parents having
[17:13] Speaker 1: to be over their shoulder. But you've said consistently throughout
[17:15] Speaker 1: this conversation, parents need to be involved. Parents actually need
[17:18] Speaker 1: to know what's going on. So parents need to make
[17:21] Speaker 1: sure that it's not their face that's signing their child
[17:23] Speaker 1: into roadblocks. Like my daughter constantly grabs the iPhone, sticks
[17:26] Speaker 1: it in front of her mum's face, my wife's face,
[17:29] Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, she's into whatever she wanted
[17:32] Speaker 1: to be using. And a lot of parents is just like, yeah, sure,
[17:34] Speaker 1: I'll look at the camera. Okay, done, off, you go
[17:36] Speaker 1: give me five minutes. I need some space. So we've
[17:39] Speaker 1: got three accounts for the Roadblocks Kids. What you're saying
[17:42] Speaker 1: is that the content rating is highly vetted both by
[17:47] Speaker 1: real people but also by technology to make sure that
[17:49] Speaker 1: the quality of the content is appropriate for young children
[17:53] Speaker 1: five to eight. You're saying that chat is off, that's
[17:58] Speaker 1: the default option. But from what I understand, you're also
[18:01] Speaker 1: indicating that with parent intervention, parents can turn chat on
[18:05] Speaker 1: so that kids can talk to selected people. Have I
[18:08] Speaker 1: got that right?
[18:09] Speaker 2: Parents will be able to turn chat on so that,
[18:12] Speaker 2: you know, the siblings can talk to each other, but
[18:15] Speaker 2: parents would have to approve that. In Roadblocks Kids and
[18:18] Speaker 2: Roadblocks select, as you get older, ye, the thing, yeah,
[18:24] Speaker 2: as you get older, like if you're thirteen, you'll you know,
[18:26] Speaker 2: you'll be able to chat with others of your similar
[18:29] Speaker 2: age and everything is filtered and we don't allow sharing
[18:31] Speaker 2: of images or video or PII and all of that stuff.
[18:35] Speaker 2: But Roadblocks Select it starts introducing more features as users
[18:39] Speaker 2: get older. We want roadblocks to be safe. It's very
[18:43] Speaker 2: important that parents have trust that the roadblocks is doing
[18:46] Speaker 2: what we can and whenever we can to keep kids safe,
[18:48] Speaker 2: that is, you know, our number one priority. But like
[18:51] Speaker 2: I said, we also think it's important that we create
[18:55] Speaker 2: a space where kids and parents can have a conversation
[18:57] Speaker 2: about what they're doing online. And I don't think that's
[19:00] Speaker 2: just about roadblocks. I mean, I would suspect that that's given.
[19:04] Speaker 2: I mean, you're obviously the expert here, and we would
[19:08] Speaker 2: certainly defer to you on this, But I would think
[19:10] Speaker 2: that the advice to parents that you should be taken
[19:11] Speaker 2: to your kids about what they're doing online and have
[19:14] Speaker 2: a conversation about who they're hanging out with and other
[19:16] Speaker 2: stuff like that applies broadley and not just a roadblocks.
[19:19] Speaker 1: It doesn't really matter what platform you're on. If you're
[19:21] Speaker 1: not involved in your children's lives, as specifically their online life,
[19:25] Speaker 1: they can be will be confronted by all kinds, all
[19:30] Speaker 1: manner of challenges. The real secret to success here is
[19:34] Speaker 1: less about the platform and more about parential involvement. However,
[19:36] Speaker 1: my pushback is parents shouldn't have to be constantly involved.
[19:41] Speaker 1: The platforms have a responsibility. Roadblocks has undeniably broken trust
[19:47] Speaker 1: over the years with parents, as children have been exposed
[19:51] Speaker 1: to and damaged by content that's been there. These changes, Matt,
[19:54] Speaker 1: are oriented towards repairing that trust. I've not been a
[19:58] Speaker 1: friend of Roadblocks sometime because of the damage that's occurred.
[20:02] Speaker 1: I can't help myself. Even though I'm not a big
[20:04] Speaker 1: believer in big tech and the better angels of their nature.
[20:08] Speaker 1: A conversation like this tells me that Roadblocks is in
[20:12] Speaker 1: Wood right now, committed to making changes, and I guess
[20:16] Speaker 1: as this rolls out, we'll have to see how that
[20:18] Speaker 1: plays out.
[20:18] Speaker 2: Indeed, well we think about creating safety on roadblocks, the
[20:22] Speaker 2: first thing we ask ourselves is would this be something
[20:25] Speaker 2: that we would expect that would be okay for our
[20:28] Speaker 2: kids if we weren't there. We want to make sure
[20:31] Speaker 2: that we're making decisions that work not just for our
[20:34] Speaker 2: own kids, that work for the Globe and work for
[20:36] Speaker 2: kids in Australia and you're kids, Matt.
[20:39] Speaker 1: Really appreciate your time, Really appreciate you sharing what you've shared,
[20:42] Speaker 1: and hopefully this leads to some continued improvement so that
[20:47] Speaker 1: our parents can feel good about their kids being online.
[20:49] Speaker 1: Thank you so much for chatting with me today.
[20:52] Speaker 2: Thank you justin I appreciate your time.
[20:53] Speaker 1: Matt, Kaufman has served as the chief safety officer at
[20:56] Speaker 1: Roadblocks since twenty twenty three. Really appreciate MAT's sincerity and
[21:01] Speaker 1: the things that is shared in today's conversation. Hopefully it's
[21:03] Speaker 1: been helpful for you as we've discussed the changes that
[21:08] Speaker 1: are landing at roblocks literally as we speak, roadblocks Kids
[21:12] Speaker 1: for five to eight year olds, roadblocks select for kids
[21:15] Speaker 1: age nine to fifteen, and then regular roadblocks accounts for
[21:18] Speaker 1: sixteen and overs. We will link to some details about
[21:22] Speaker 1: those changes in the show notes, as well as some
[21:25] Speaker 1: other info about roblocks that we hope will be useful
[21:27] Speaker 1: as you talk to the kids about how all this
[21:29] Speaker 1: works out. The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin
[21:32] Speaker 1: Ruland from Bridge Media. Nim Hammond's provides our admin and
[21:35] Speaker 1: other support, and for more information and make your family happier,
[21:38] Speaker 1: please visit us at Happyfamilies dot com dot a u

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