Trolls may have to stay under their bridges from now on
The International Game Developers Association is reported to be working alongside the FBI and other online harassment experts in a bid to stamp out harassment. As a result, it seems, of recent events within the industry, the groups are teaming up to outline and detail ways that developers can target harassment and, hopefully, keep it from happening in the first place.
IGDA executive director Kate Edwards stated when speaking to Polygon that the FBI reached out to her at San Diego Comic-Con in July to discuss the capability of the FBI to respond to electronic forms of harassment.
Game developers and their associates have been subject to an increasing amount of bullying, “doxxing,” death threats, and have been plagued by misinformation being spread about themselves and their products.
In a statement posted on their official site, IGDA espoused their support for “diverse viewpoints and healthy debate” in and on the game industry. The statement went on to point out that personal attacks are not only morally and ethically unsound, but are crossing the line into what is considered to be illegal actions in many countries.
The IGDA urges the gaming communiy as a whole to take a stand against this behavior. The FBI and IGDA will continue to keep in contact as the IGDA constructs the online resource to help harassed developers.
FBI working with game developer association to combat online harassment [Polygon]
