Kids Are Playing Poker Online in Virtual Reality Games — Legally
Concerns grow that new generations of immersive games are teaching children how to gamble online, raising the risk of addiction.
Players during a round of virtual poker on Pokerstars VR.
During a round of poker in a virtual reality casino earlier this month, one player at the table was berated with sexually explicit language.
The player, dressed in a purple top and a white anime-style haircut, was highly likely to be a child, based on their voice and their reaction to the abuse. While playing rounds of Texas hold ‘em, a Bloomberg News reporter saw users smoking virtual cigars and passing around digital guns while the suspected child played with a toy donkey next to their chips. In another poker game, a player said they were in the fifth grade, which would probably mean they were aged either 10 or 11.