UK Could Classify Loot Box as Gambling Product to Protect Children

Loot boxes could be reclassified as gambling products over concern they are training children to gamble.

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport is going to launch a call for evidence on the increasingly common feature of games such as the football franchise Fifa.

The move has been spurred by mounting concern that the mechanics of loot boxes are encouraging gambling-style behaviour among children. Loot boxes allow players to spend money on in-game rewards such as special characters or equipment, without knowing what they will get.

If ministers opt to reclassify loot boxes, the decision would have a significant impact on game developers, who could be forced to withdraw some titles or redesign them so that they can be sold to people under 18.

The DCMS select committee heard evidence last year that loot box winnings can be easily exchanged for cash on third-party websites and that their use by game developers was likely to “facilitate profiting from problem gamblers.”

In a subsequent report, the influential committee advised that they should be considered gambling products.

“They are a virtually speculative commodity that only help to normalise and encourage young people to take a chance,” Labour MP Carolyn Harris, who chairs a cross-party group of MPs investigating gambling-related harm, said.

“All too often this will lead to youngsters developing an addiction to gambling.”

Research by academics at the University of York published last year found that loot boxes are increasingly prevalent, featuring in about 71% of the most popular titles on the gaming portal Steam, compared with 4% a decade ago.