Square Enix enacts new anti-harassment policy to protect its staff from real world and online abuse

Square Enix has annoucned a new group customer harassment policy to protect its staff against harassment both online and in the real world. It announced this via a blog post in both Japanese and English, which you can read here.

In this post, it acknowledges that while feedback from players is important, the acts of a certain subset of people far pass this line and venture into hostile action. It states these actions “not only prevent our employees and partners from engaging in their work with a sense of security but also causes disruptions to other customers” and that it’ll not tolerate such actions.

To combat such actions, Square Enix has stated it reserves the right to cease providing services to individuals found in breach of these guidelines, and in “egregious” cases, reserves the right to take legal action against those conducting such actions.

Examples of harassment Square Enix provided in this policy include acts of violence or violent behavior, defamation, trespassing, unlawful restraint including via phone calls and online inquiries, discriminatory behavior, and more. Square Enix has also listed out examples of undue behavior, which includes unreasonable changes or exchange of product or request for monetary compensation, unreasonable response or request for apology, excessive requests for the provision of products and services, and the unreasonable and excessive demands for punishment of employees.

This policy, original written and published in Japanese, applies to Square Enix staff across the world. It comes at a time where such actions seem particularly common, especially on social media. This has happened to Square Enix staff before, as last year FF14 director Naoki Yoshida asked fans to cease attacks against the voice actress of Wuk Lamat as well as the localization team.

It’s a important stance for Square Enix to take, and one that should provide some peace of mind to those working at hte company who fear such harassment coming their way. Let us know what you feel about this below, as well as your thoughts on the policy – does it go far enough?