Female Avatar sexually assaulted in Meta VR

The Avatar of a 21-year old researcher was sexually assaulted on Meta's virtual reality platform, Horizon Worlds. 

SumOfUs, a corperate accountability group the researcher worked for, said the incident is evidence that Meta needs to plan better to mitigate harms on the platform. While talking to BBC, the company said Horizon Worlds had tools to ensure users have a "positive experience". 

Meta failed to take notice of the report filed by SumOfUs, while the company was eager to pursue safety procedures on the VR platform and investigate the issue and take action. 

Available only in US and Canada, Horizon Worlds provides users with simple and cartoonish avatars, however, SumOfUs believes sexual assaults on the platform can be intensely traumatic. 

Vicky Wyatt, the group's campaign director said, "It still counts, it still has a real impact on users." She said that the victim felt a "part of them was really shocked, part of them thought, 'OK, this isn't my real body, this is an avatar' and another part of them thought 'this is really, really important research that I'm doing, I need to capture this footage'".

In the footage obtained by BBC, two male avatars passed lewd comments and shared a virtual bottle of drink.

Previous sexual assault cases had prompted Meta to introduce safety rules on its VR platform in February. Its Personal Boundary ensures that the avatars stay within a set distance of 4 feet from one another to avoid unwanted interactions. According to Meta, "If someone tries to enter your Personal Boundary, the system will halt their forward movement as they reach the boundary."

SumOfUs reported that the researcher was encouraged by the assaulters to disable the feature protecting her, while also facing homophobic slurs and virtual gun violence. The company has asked for a a risk assessment of the human rights impacts of the metaverse by Meta.