Xbox Sets the Stage to Ban Users with “Perceived” Misconduct with Voice Reporting Feature

Microsoft is releasing a new feature that allows for Xbox users to snitch on people who verbally abuse them. Let’s get one thing straight; I am not in support of verbal abuse, nor do support cancel culture.

According to Microsoft’s own page, these are the parameters of their new feature:

• Xbox’s latest safety feature allows players to capture and report inappropriate voice activity on any multiplayer game with in-game voice chat on Xbox Series X|S and Xbox One.
• Players who experience or witness inappropriate verbal behavior can “capture now, report later” minimizing impact to their gameplay.
• Xbox’s player reporting and evidence capabilities now cover all content including text, image, video, and voice, further supporting player safety.
• The voice reporting feature will be available first to Xbox Insiders to gather feedback from the community.

Players come to Xbox to build friendships, be competitive, and to experience incredible games – and they expect to be treated fairly, for interactions to be free of hate or harassment.

Xbox Wire

The Inevitable Abuse of the Feature

Again, nobody should be harassed. My (presumably unpopular) take is simply a result of the social media world we currently live in. Xbox is going to become “Facebook” in how it handles disputes. How many people do you know who have been in “Facebook Jail?”

This new feature will almost certainly be abused. Say something, one person doesn’t like and it gets reported. How would Microsoft handle the situation? Would you lose your online access or your entire account? Your account holds all of your digital purchases. As we know from “YouTube,” the end-user agreement changes often.

It should be interesting to see what happens. We are living in a digital world, and if subjectively identified “bad behavior” could potentially limit your digital reach, we are going down very bad path.