Meta Quest VR Safety design, tools and policies.

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In the previous post we outlined key legislation relating to laws designed to protect women and young girls, derived from EU directives and UK legislation (both historical and more recent). We will now look specifically at Meta Quest's own safety design policies as we ask.. 

Does VR design adequately (and as a standard) protect women and girls from virtually embodied ‘physical’ and psychological harms? 

To answer this we begin by examining Metaquests design standards. Clearly it will be necessary to look at other VR development platforms but Meta is one of the most used, and financially accessible platforms and so it seems like a good starting point. As we do so, we will think about psychological and physical harms women experience as part of their lived experience in everyday life as we ask, are these requirements adequately protective? 

 

We ask... 

Are women protected by meta while online when using their different platforms? 

Looking at VR, Are women specifically protected in Metaquest? If so, how…? 

Do women experience virtual assaults while in social VR apps? and if they do, What can be done to protect them? 

How can women they protect themselves in virtual spaces? How is the app designed to protect them?


We will now briefly outline, and signpost to, meta's own safety policies, tools and content while thinking about women’s particular safety needs. 

1. Safety policies: Facebook | Whatsapp | Instagram | Messenger 

2. Safety tools: Womens Safety | Survivors | Security | Privacy | Wellbeing | Scams |Developer Hub

3. Safety content: Guidelines

4. Womens safety: Outline, survivors of abuse and advisors 



Meta safety policies 

Meta's Safety policies : The details of this are presented in a video The 5 Pillars approach - This includes Meta's policies and procedures they have designed to protect users on Whatsapp, Facebook, Instagram and Messenger. 



Meta Safety tools

Giving users control of how protected they are.. (What protection are Meta implementing into the design process? What criteria is relevant to VR development?)

Womens Safety:  
Survivors of abuse : Privacy settings and reporting
Security 
Privacy
Wellbeing 
Scams


Metaquest development hub 

Meta Horizon OS Developer Policy Center


Code of conduct for virtual experiences 

A specific area of interest is Meta's Code of conduct for virtual experiences. 


Meta's values

voice

safety

authenticity

dignity

privacy.


There doesn't seem to be any further detail regarding a definition of their values but they do go on to say what contravenes them... 

The Meta website states,  

The following conduct and content are contrary to the values above:

  • Don't do or promote anything that is designed to deceive other users, Meta, developers or that otherwise abuse our products or services, such as:
    • Pretending to be another person or entity, stealing someone's identity, or creating or using fake accounts (if role-playing or parodying, make sure that it's clear to others)
    • Engaging in fraud, scams or other deceptive activities
    • Gathering or sharing sensitive personal information, doxing others, compromising user accounts, sharing account login information, engaging in unauthorised access or sharing malware
    • Creating or using a Meta account that is not intended for your age.
  • Don't do or promote anything that's illegal, abusive or could lead to physical harm, such as:
    • Sexualising, exploiting or abusing minors
    • Bullying, harassing, stalking or hateful behaviour
    • Advocating, engaging in or promoting violence, human exploitation, human trafficking or human smuggling. Supporting or representing groups or individuals involved in terrorism, hate-based organisations or criminal groups
    • Promoting or coordinating acts of physical harm, such as sexual or physical assault, or suicide or self-harm
    • Any form of non-consensual intimate activity, including sharing intimate images of others without consent
    • Violating intellectual property rights, such as improperly using copyrighted or trademarked materials
    • Unlawfully selling, exchanging or promoting regulated goods

Public spaces such as open lobbies, multiplayer games and public events create special opportunities for broad audiences. Please be especially mindful of your behaviour and content in public experiences and spaces, as not all speech and behaviour that might be acceptable in a closed experience is acceptable in a public experience. Also, do not take advantage of the unique characteristics of public experiences by sharing content that others do not wish to see. Developers (including Meta) may take action on users or experiences if these behaviours take place in public experiences, given their unique characteristics. Do not:

  • Spam others (repeatedly offer commercial services, goods or requests) or promote regulated goods or services
  • Engage in or share sexually explicit or excessively violent behaviour or content.

Developers, as well as creators and admins within apps, may also establish their own rules – above and beyond this Code of Conduct – so please make sure that you read their rules as well. You also must comply with applicable laws, including local laws.

The app must abide by laws relating to domestic abuse. There can be now controlling coersive mechanisms within the app or embodied 'physical' virtual violence as defined by EU and UK law (referred to in the previous post). 

Attacks have taken place in VR which it has been proven, have resulted in the same PTSD, trauma response as it would in real-life attacks.

This is important when thinking about Meta's Value of providing safe experiences although it is unclear as to how these are assessed in the vetting process. 

Clearly, abusive behaviour and language are clearly obvious but in real-life the pattern of coercive control is not. 

The question arises as to whether 'dark patterns' relating to psychological control and manipulation can be detected, even though it is clearly illegal. 


Metaquest safety content

Meta quest content guidelines : The guidelines are what you would expect but are interesting to note from the persepctive of developing a high trauma training application that could include excessively violent content or suicide references. It seems obvious that the apps would not be generally released on the platform and would need to be side loaded onto headsets, but without a clear safety criteria.. exactly how safe would that be?


Womens safety

Meta Womens safety and survivors of abuse

Global womens safety expert advisors

  • Bishakha Datta, Point of View (India)
  • Enrica Duncan, NOSSAS/Mapa do Acolhimento (Brazil)
  • Asher Flynn, Monash University (Australia)
  • Audace Garnett, National Network to End Domestic Violence (US)
  • Caitríona Gleeson, Women for Election (Ireland)
  • Margarita Guillé Tamayo, Interamerican Network of Women Shelters (Mexico)
  • Neema Iyer, Pollicy (Uganda)
  • Dr Ji-yeon Lee, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies (Korea)
  • Kalliopi Mingeirou, UN Women (Global)
  • Lisa Moore, The Women's Foundation (Hong Kong)
  • Tunggal Pawestri, Yayasan Hivos (Indonesia)
  • Mariane Dorothy Rosario, Youth Activist (Philippines)
  • Jyoti Vadehra, Centre for Social Research (India)
  • Stephanie Willman Bordat, MRA Mobilising for Rights Associates (Morocco)

(There is no reference to a UK advisor on this list). 



Survivors of abuse 

Survivors of abuse : 

Privacy settings and reporting are mechanisms provided by Meta to help users protect themselves and report abusive behaviour.

Referring back to the point made earlier in regards to Meta's safety value, how closely does VR align with real-life understanding of domestic abuse? If in real-life coercive control is difficult to identify (especially by those entrenched in it's tightening loop), Can Meta's VR apps be analysed for this kind of behaviour? 

One such mechanism immediately springs to mind, and that is the blocking of exits and the prevention of both psychological and physical escape. The design solution would be to have a consistent escape button that takes the user into a safe space. This may be Metaquest's home environment but could also be included within the app itself. 

The exit button is the starting point, for finding solutions to provide psychologically safe virtual experiences for all users (and most critically survivors of domestic abuse).. 

1 in 3 women users that have experienced domestic abuse within their intimate relationships deserve such protection while in a fully immersive-interactive experience. Not to provide this is a criminal offence according to current legislation in EU and UK. 

It's useful to note that Meta's values and contravention of their values does not specifically state exactly what is required to protect against coercive control but refers generally to local laws. There is no VC that covers this aspect of safety. This suggests that there could be a gap (as there is in real-life cases) that exists between the identification of domestic abuse and the prosecution of it. 

This requires further investigation as we ask, Is it reasonable to include teh assessment for coercive control and domestic abuse genrally in Meta's (and other VR platforms) quality control process? 

It's possibly a very big ask... 


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