The popular teenage gaming site that's a haven for pedophiles

Popular online game Roblox is an 'X-rated pedophile hellscape' which exposes children to 'grooming, pornography and violent content', according to new research.

Hindenburg Research issued damning findings on Tuesday after a protracted investigation into the controversial kid's game.

With no set age restrictions, Roblox has become extremely popular for young kids, offering a series of different games and interactive tools.

But the new research paper references an alarming amount of inappropriate links which are at a child's fingertips when they are on the game.

'Core to the problem is that Roblox's social media features allow pedophiles to efficiently target hundreds of children, with no up-front screening to prevent them from joining the platform,' the paper stated.

To test the theory, researchers attempted to create accounts using names of infamous child molesters and criminals.

They attempted to create an account under the name Earl Brian Bradley - a pedophile convicted of molesting 103 children - but learned the username was already taken, along with a host of variants, including earlbrianbradley69.

There were 900 variations of the name Jeffrey Epstein, and 600 hits when searching 'Diddy' games. 

Some of these games were titled 'Diddy Party', 'Run from Diddy Simulator' and, separately, 'Escape to Epstein Island.' 

Kids on 'child accounts' - that is, under the age of 13 - were also able to search 'adult' to find inappropriate content. 

According to Roblox, 21 percent of users are under the age of nine. 

Researchers claimed they were easily able to trackdown games and groups trading child pornography and soliciting sexual favors.

In all, Roblox self-reported more than 13,000 incidents of child exploitation to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in 2023.

The research references several  high profile, disturbing cases of pedophiles using Roblox to groom victims.

In Wales in 2018, a 29-year-old man was arrested for grooming 150 children via the game.

Another man was charged in New Jersey after he kidnapped an 11-year-old girl he met while playing the game. He later pleaded guilty to one count of Coercion and Enticement of a Minor.

Arnold Castillo, 23 and also from New Jersey, was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison in 2023 after pleading guilty to Transportation of a Minor with Intent to Engage in Criminal Sexual Activity and Coercion and Enticement of a Minor.

He paid for an Uber to pick the 15-year-old girl up and bring her across state lines to his home. He sexually abused the girl and attempted to purchase 'Plan B' to ensure she did not fall pregnant.

A Roblox spokesperson said they 'totally reject the claims made in the report.'

'Safety and civility have been foundational to Roblox since our inception nearly two decades ago, and we have invested heavily throughout our history in our Trust & Safety efforts. 

'Every day, tens of millions of people of all ages have a safe and positive experience on Roblox, abiding by our Community Standards. We take any content or behavior on the platform that doesn’t abide by our standards extremely seriously and we have a robust set of proactive and preventative safety measures designed to catch and prevent malicious or harmful activity on our platform.'

Roblox's chief safety officer, Matt Kaufman, has previously hit back at complaints about the safety measures on the game.

'We will continue to work tirelessly to keep our users safe and be vigilant against bad actors who might attempt to circumvent our safety systems,' he said. 

'Only 0.0063% of total content was flagged as violating our policies around issues such as bullying, hate speech and violent extremism via our detection and reporting systems.'