ECPAT International is a global network dedicated to ending the sexual exploitation of children in all of its forms. For more than 35 years, and across more than 100 countries, ECPAT has worked to protect children from sexual exploitation and abuse through research, legal and policy reform, technical support, capacity strengthening, advocacy and partnerships.
Support from the Caring Masculinity Fund (CMF) allowed ECPAT to strengthen harm-preventive measures in the online gaming space — zooming into how products and industry practices can better center child safety and challenge rigid gender norms by design: not as an afterthought, and in ways that make sense to each platform.
With support from the CMF, ECPAT worked with Women in Games Asia to organise the first ever regional Game Jam on breaking gender based stereotypes and biases. The Game Jam saw young game developers from South-east Asia designing games that actively challenge gender norms, rigid ideas of masculinities, and promote help-seeking behaviours for children intentionally – and which are still fun. Through the Game Jam, ECPAT demonstrated that child safety and commercially-viable game design can successfully co-exist.
“The atmosphere during the Game Jam was collaborative and creative, with developers, mentors, and child safety experts all learning from one another,” ECPAT told Equimundo. “It was important because it demonstrated that safer, more inclusive games can be designed from the very beginning of the development process.”
The CMF made it possible to pilot this innovative approach to online safety.
“Real solutions to online safety come from children and young people themselves,” said an ECPAT team member. “The CMF funded Game Jam allowed us to do precisely that: to hear the voices of young developers.”
ECPAT was supported by the fund to move beyond producing guidance and research to actively shaping industry practice: influencing policy and platform design, and building sustainable partnerships – partnerships that will continue advancing child safety and gender transformation in online gaming after the end of the grant. This is a uniquely sustainable approach to funding.
The Game Jam has created a practical, replicable model to online gaming safety that can be adapted in other regions, helping to grow a wider community of developers committed to designing safer and more inclusive games.
ECPAT is still gathering data, but the impact of Game Jam is clear to see. ECPAT has established new collaborations with industry partners, and participant feedback for ECPAT’s CMF funded work consistently highlights the value of their innovative work to combine technical game development with insights to boost safety and gender equality.
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