Australian Federal Police warn of extremists using gaming platforms to recruit children
Religious and ideological extremists are using games like Roblox and online chat and gaming forums as a recruitment tool for Australian children.
The AFP has announced growing concern about the online recruitment practices of a number of extremist groups.
Over the past two years, the law enforcement agency has seen a marked increase in the number of investigations it conducts involving children as young as 12 who espouse “violent extremist ideologies.”
“The AFP is aware of ideologically motivated violent extremism (IMVE) and religiously motivated violent extremism (RMVE) groups and individuals interacting with children online,” the AFP said in a statement.
Extremists are taking advantage of forums and games popular among young people, and some are also creating their own networks to share propaganda and recruit new members. However, there is one game in particular that is popular as a recruiting tool: Roblox.
Roblox is a popular online game creation platform where users can create their own games to play and share with friends. It is a free platform available on a variety of platforms and is extremely popular with children under 16 years of age. Roblox has more than 164 million users, 45 percent of whom are under 12 years old.
It is that popularity that makes it an ideal platform for extremists to not only share their views to recruit new recruits but also to create their own content. AFP has seen re-enactments of Nazi concentration camps, Chinese re-education camps and Middle East conflict zones and ISIS propaganda. The goal of many of these virtual creations is to encourage young people to get involved and represent extremist ideologies, blurring the lines between the online and real world.
Roblox It has also been used to host several virtual pro-Palestine demonstrations following the Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023. Many have been removed, although the game’s developers have neither confirmed nor denied that it was related to reports of hate speech.
Extremists are also known to target more vulnerable groups in these online communities, such as neurodiverse children and children raised in disruptive homes.
“With over 3.22 billion active online gamers worldwide, these extremists are attempting to target a significant portion of the global population to spread their views and propaganda to recruit young people through popular platforms and games. to encourage them to adopt an extremist or radicalized attitude. point of view,” said AFP Deputy Commissioner Krissy Barrett in a statement.
“These extremist groups and individuals are using these games and online platforms as a way to transmit violent material and propaganda, across a variety of extremist ideologies.”
Joint counter-terrorism teams, of which the AFP is a part, are actively working to counter these recruitment activities.
“We urge anyone with information related to concerning online activity to come forward and help us keep our young people safe,” Deputy Commissioner Barrett said.
