After women claimed sexual harassment in the virtual world, Meta added a personal boundary

People in the Metaverse may face sexual harassment through their virtual avatars, thus Meta has introduced a 'personal barrier' that restricts avatars from approaching each other within a certain distance, making it easy to avoid inappropriate interactions.

Horizon Worlds and Horizon Venues virtual reality (VR) systems now have a 'Personal Boundary' function, according to Meta.

By default, the feature will give the impression that your avatar and others are separated by about four feet.

"Over time, we`ll continue to make improvements as we learn how this affects people`s experiences," said Vivek Sharma, Vice President, Horizon.

When someone tries to enter your Personal Boundary, the system will stop them as soon as they approach it.

"You won`t feel it -- there is no haptic feedback. This builds upon our existing hand harassment measures that were already in place, where an avatar`s hands would disappear if they encroached upon someone`s personal space," Sharma said in a blog post late on Friday.

Sharma believes that this will aid in the establishment of behavioural norms, which is critical for a new medium like VR.

"In the future, we`ll explore the possibility of adding in new controls and UI changes, like letting people customise the size of their Personal Boundary," he informed.

Horizon Worlds was released to the general public after a long period of beta testing.

A beta user claimed that her avatar had been molested by an unknown person.