listen to the hate speech it has unfortunately become commonplace when playing multiplayer titles. There will always be people who take out their personal frustrations on video games, or who simply enjoy swearing from the comfort of their couch. However, in Xbox They are working on a feature that could help identify and penalize offensive players.
One of the biggest drawbacks to multiplayer games is that their systems for reporting inappropriate behavior rarely work. Largely because the monitoring they can perform is quite limited. Xbox users therefore cannot provide sufficient evidence to prove the presence of offensive players in their game. Well, those of Redmond intend to attack this problem in a more efficient way.
Microsoft announced that, soon, you will be able to capture audio clips of up to 60 seconds of your player games. Its proposal will also allow you to add a written message as context. After, you will be able to send the recording to the Xbox security and moderation team. The objective, of course, is to identify offensive players in order to penalize them. In the worst case, they can be permanently banned from the platform.
“If a player experiences something in our community that they don’t like and wants to report it to us, they have several options to do so. We proactively moderate text, images, and videos, and the launch of voice moderation takes care of covering that part. audio,” said Kim Kunes, director of trust and safety at Xbox, in an interview with The Verge.
It is worth mentioning, yes, that the Xbox audio capture to report offensive players still in testing phase. Only members of the Xbox Insider program can access it. On the other hand, at the moment limited to English speaking countries. Specifically: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand. However, the feature is expected to be available for other languages at a later date.
Xbox, on the hunt for offensive players
On Xbox they have been very clear in explaining that audio recording is solely and exclusively for moderation purposes. In fact, it will not be possible to download or share it with someone outside of the Xbox security team. “Recording is done strictly via the reporting feature and is only available for moderation purposes. Therefore, the player will not be able to save or share the audio outside of that system,” Kunes added.
Another issue that you must take into account is that, once recorded to audio, only stored for a maximum period of 24 hours. When the period ends, the file is automatically deleted. The best thing to do, then, is to immediately share the clip with Xbox moderators, who will know what action to take against offensive players.
While some security systems today are bolstered by automated algorithms and artificial intelligence, Xbox prefers not to venture into these waters yet. Those led by Phil Spencer say that recordings will be inspected by human moderators. In addition, they will keep in touch with the complainants to inform them how their report is progressing.
Xbox also mentions that those offensive players who are penalized will have the opportunity to appeal their case. However, they promise to be working hard to make their moderation system fair.
When will it be available to everyone? Unfortunately, it is an unknown quantity. From Xbox they affirm that they need to continue carrying out tests to obtain feedback from their players and implement improvements. However, he warns that in the coming months we will see progress in this regard. Is it the end of offensive players? At least they will think twice before opening their mouths…