UK Minister Ian Murray Tells Parliament Under-16s Will Not Be Able to Talk to Strangers in Online Games
LONDON — Ian Murray, the UK minister for creative industries, media and online safety, told Parliament on November 2 that children under 16 in Britain will lose the ability to talk to strangers in online games and to livestream themselves. They will still be matched with stranger players, he said, but without the ability to communicate with them.
Murray was speaking in a Westminster Hall debate triggered by a petition against the planned under-16 social media ban, which had gathered 217,682 signatures. He said the government would bring gaming into its approach through later feature-specific regulations covering stranger communications, and named Roblox as the biggest problem in this area. For 16- and 17-year-olds, stranger communication will be switched off by default.
Under the timetable Murray set out, the first regulations for the social media ban will be laid before the Christmas recess and take effect in spring 2027; rules on features such as in-game stranger chat will follow, with no date yet set and open questions including how a stranger is defined and whether voice chat, text chat or both are covered. The campaign group Gamer's Voice criticised the plan on November 3, warning it could cut young players off from their gaming communities.
(Source: UK Parliament)
Source: UK Parliament
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：美国一家电子游戏厅内景（资料图）。Dustin M. Ramsey 摄，CC BY-SA 2.5，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: Inside a video arcade in the United States (file photo). By Dustin M. Ramsey, CC BY-SA 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons.
