The government of Qatar has blocked access to the popular gaming platform Roblox after a storm of complaints on social media about the safety of children playing the games.
As of Wednesday, Roblox users in Qatar found themselves confronted by “No Network” and “Site Cannot Be Reached” errors when attempting to access the games from the Roblox app or website. The app is still available for download from Apple and Google Play in Qatar, but it cannot be used after it has been installed.
According to Internet freedom watchdogs, huge “access anomalies” began appearing in Roblox traffic in Qatar on Wednesday morning.
Large social media campaigns have been waged in Qatar, and from the outside world, demanding an end to Roblox due to fears of child endangerment. After the Qatar ban went into effect, many of the social media users who contributed to the anti-Roblox campaign began tagging U.S. President Donald Trump and urging him to take similar action against the platform.
Roblox has been criticized around the world, including by child safety advocates in the United States, for exposing children to inappropriate content and predatory behavior. Roblox is a fusion of social media and gaming, offering an extensive “virtual world” where players can interact and share information before diving into games.
Critics say the social media layer is where inappropriate content sharing and grooming take place. Roblox contends it has done all it can to police the behavior of its users. Complicating the situation is that Roblox is enormously popular with young children, creating a target-rich environment for predators.
In October 2023, a Delaware man was accused of kidnapping an 11-year-old girl from New Jersey after meeting and grooming her through Roblox. The company responded by saying it offered to assist law enforcement in the case and insisted it works “tirelessly to prevent grooming” by employing “a team of thousands of moderators who enforce a strict set of community standards.”
In February 2025, a lawsuit filed in San Mateo, California, charged Roblox and another gaming social media platform, Discord, with facilitating the abuse of a 13-year-old child. The lawsuit accused the companies of providing inadequate defenses against predators. The young plaintiff was contacted via direct message by an adult who wanted to exchange nude photos, and later solicited the child for sex, offering Roblox gift cards as rewards if he complied.
This week, Roblox banned a 22-year-old YouTuber called “Schlep” who has built a successful channel around confronting child predators on Roblox. Schlep was formerly an avid Roblox player who says he was approached by groomers on the platform and decided to fight back by hunting them down.
Roblox lawyers issued a cease-and-desist order against Schlep for allegedly “undermining Roblox’s safety efforts” with his own investigative activities. Schlep’s posts featured prominently in the effort to convince Qatar to ban the gaming platform.
Schlep was outraged that a “multi-billion dollar company” would threaten him with litigation because “I catch predators on their platform.”
“Within the last year, me and my team have gotten six predators arrested within the Roblox community. Almost all of them have admitted to doing this before to other Roblox users,” the YouTuber said.
Qatar is not the first country to ban Roblox altogether. Turkey blocked access to the gaming platform in August 2024, claiming Roblox had been abused to “undermine our social structure, abuse of children, encouragement of violence, and activities that will negatively affect the development of our children.”
Turkish officials did not specify exactly what abusive behavior prompted the sudden ban, but they were critical of the company for offering a virtual currency called “Robux” that children could purchase and spend.
Roblox appealed the ban in Turkey and, in October, it offered to open a physical office in the country if the ban was lifted. The company said it could play a positive role in Turkish society by offering “a platform for learning, creation, and meaningful connection.”
Roblox also said it was prepared to company with Turkey’s “unique needs,” which suggests an offer to play ball with the political priorities of Turkey’s authoritarian government. To date, the company’s efforts to resume operations in Turkey have been unsuccessful.
Roblox has also been banned in Oman and China. Oman banned it for unspecified reasons, widely suspected to pertain to child safety. China evidently cracked down on the gaming platform as part of the Chinese Communist Party’s general paranoia about exposing its citizens to information from overseas. Roblox attempted to create a version of its service that would be compatible with Chinese Communist Party censorship demands, but the product has not been released to date.
Roblox was temporarily banned in Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, and Nepal, but those bans were later rescinded. It could go without saying that Roblox is banned in North Korea, just like everything else is banned in North Korea.
