Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to (a) protect young people from the effects of addiction to loot boxes in computer games and (b) raise awareness among parents of those effects.

The government launched a call for evidence on 23 September 2020 to seek detailed information on the impact of loot boxes on players, particularly children and young people. The call for evidence will run until 22 November 2020 and examines concerns that loot boxes may encourage gambling-like behaviour and lead to problem gambling, as well as considering the size and scale of the loot box market in the UK, and the impact of current voluntary and statutory protections.

The government stands ready to take action should the outcomes of the call for evidence support taking a new approach to ensure users, and particularly young people, are better protected.

The government also continues to work with industry to encourage the use of parental controls that can disable or limit access and spending on video games devices. We welcomed the launch on 3 November 2020 of the games industry’s Get Set Go campaign, a continuation of the Get Smart about P.L.A.Y. campaign that launched in January 2020 supporting parents to set up parental controls.