Since the 2017 shutdown, people started launching their own unlicensed versions of the game like Club Penguin Online and Club Penguin Rewritten so fans could continue to play the games into the future.Īs social distancing orders have gone into effect across the globe, old fans of Club Penguin, Minecraft, and Webkinz have returned to their former favorite games. By the end of 2018, Disney shut down Club Penguin Island, too. Soon after its closure, Disney launched Club Penguin Island, which received plenty of criticism from the old game’s fans for lacking popular features in the original game. However, Disney did tell BBC Friday, “Child safety is a top priority for the Walt Disney Company and we are appalled by the allegations of criminal activity and abhorrent behaviour on this unauthorised website that is illegally using the Club Penguin brand and characters for its own purposes.”ĭisney continued, “We continue to enforce our rights against this, and other, unauthorised uses of the Club Penguin game.”ĭisney purchased Club Penguin in 2007 and officially shut the game down in January 2017 after it had seen a dramatic drop-off in users over the years, according to TechCrunch. It’s unclear if the child pornography arrest was related to the project’s broader moderation issues.Ĭlub Penguin Online and Disney did not immediately respond to a request for comment fro The Verge. A London man associate with the website was arrested for suspicion of possessing child abuse images by Metropolitan Police, according to BBC. “If anyone does try to revive the game, it’ll be extremely difficult now as you’ll have to worry about Disney, and in all honestly, it isn’t worth it,” the admin wrote.Ī BBC investigation found that the Club Penguin Online game was not being moderated by staff, and it was littered with racist and anti-semitic content.

Club Penguin appears to have complied with the order as of publication, the website is no longer available.

What happened to club penguin island