

By George Geddes

Special to VPEsports

FaZe Patrick “H1ghsky1” is a professional Fortnite player for FaZe Clan. However, H1ghsky1’s age has called into question the legal implications of FaZe’s decision in bringing him onto the team.



According to a report from HollywoodReporter, Tfue’s lawyers understood that H1ghsky was 11 years old at the time of the minor signing his contract with FaZe. The lawyers claimed that H1ghsky1 and his parents were told to lie about his age, in order to protect his contract with the North American organization.



The HollywoodReporter article states that FaZe Clan are breaking Labour Code 1700.36, which states that:

To follow, Kevin Hitt from Upcomer has discovered that H1ghsky1 is now 12 years old, and is still actively competing.



H1ghsky1’s community

FaZe Clan has employed a minor, knowing that he is too young to compete in Fortnite tournaments, stream on Twitch or, actively upload to YouTube.



However, it has recently come to light that H1ghsky’s community has been knowingly censoring any information regarding his age, in order to stop rumours of his real age circulating.



Obviously, if this story became widespread, it could have drastic implications for H1ghsky1 and his Fortnite career, as well as damaging FaZe Clan.



H1ghsky1’s Discord channel has understood that his age is a hot topic, and have made rules to punish those who even bring it up. For example, this discord user was kicked from the channel because he simply asked how old H1ghsky1 was.

This discord user was kicked, just for asking how old H1ghsky1 was.



Moreover, H1ghsky1’s twitch channel channel is highly moderated. Firstly, you must be a follower for at least a week in order to talk in the channel. Furthermore, you cannot discuss his age in the chat, otherwise users will also be punished.



The command !13 results in this message



Implications

According to Epic Games, a player must be 13 years of age in order to compete in events. However, due to H1ghsky1’s age being 12, he is not allowed to participate. H1ghsky1 has been competing in the Fortnite World Cup qualifiers for weeks.



Moreover, H1ghsky1 is not allowed to manage his own Google Plus, and therefore, his YouTube. The streaming services’ policy states that 13 is the minimum age one should be in order to manage their own account.



However, FaZe Clan have specifically mentioned that they are the ones managing H1ghsky1’s account.



This would be acceptable. However, it shows that FaZe know of H1ghsky1’s real age, and that they are aware of that fact that he is not old enough to manage his own account.



Similarly, H1ghsky1 is not old enough to stream on Twitch. Although, he currently streams regularly with over 424,000 followers.



To conclude, FaZe H1ghsky’s community and management at FaZe Clan are knowingly censoring and withholding factual information regarding his age.

