Ask any parents’ thoughts about their minor and adolescent children involved in online gaming and you’ll likely hear a response expressing some level of frustration regarding the amount of time kids spend in gaming environments, as well as the associated negative impacts on shared family time, academic pursuits and individual behavior, in general. In fact, studies have shown that long-term violent game play can increase aggressive thoughts and behaviors both for the short and long term, and that children and adolescents who play more video games tend to also have more attention problems than their non-gaming peers.
To address these issues, IEEE has recently approved IEEE P2812™—Guide for Minor Guardianship System for Online Mobile Gaming, a standard project aimed at strengthening parents’ monitoring of minors’ participation in online mobile games. The project, sponsored by the IEEE Consumer Electronics Society, will work to provide parents a tool so that they can better monitor gaming participation and help ensure greater privacy in online mobile gaming environments. The guide also applies to the design and development of services for a game monitoring system for minors, as well as the selection and receipt of services by online game users.
According to Truman Yang, chair of the IEEE Online Game Minor Guardianship System Working Group, “While individual companies involved in the gaming industry have developed world-class consumer protection tools, including parental controls and responsible game-education initiatives to ensure players are engaging in the safest environments, at present, there remains a lack of consensus in the industry concerning guidance. IEEE P2812 sets us on course to build consensus on how best to establish a safer, more secure gaming environment for minors—one that ultimately results in more moderate gameplay and improved outcomes for minors engaged in mobile online gaming.”
Stakeholders in IEEE P2812 include government agencies, parents, mobile gaming industry developers and producers, social media networks, and mobile application developers.
Learn more about the development of IEEE P2812 today.