Japanese free speech activist and former assemblyman Zenko Kurishita reported on October 28 that the country’s Financial Services Agency (FSA) does not consider the sale of adult games alone to be a sufficient reason for financial institutions to deny developers banking services. This comes following Kurishita\u2019s meeting with the agency over the ongoing issue of domestic creators facing so-called debanking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Over the past few years, numerous independent adult game developers and indie studios in Japan have reported having their transactions blocked by domestic banks, particularly payments from overseas publishers related to international sales on platforms such as Steam. The cases so far have involved multiple different financial institutions, with some banks explicitly citing adult content as the issue, and others refusing to provide a specific reason. You can find a list of our coverage of individual cases at the bottom of this article.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To bring attention to the issue, Kurishita recently facilitated a meeting between the FSA and creators who have personally experienced debanking, allowing them to explain their circumstances directly to the agency. Among them was Mistilteinn, an indie adult game studio that had at one point been unable to access its overseas revenue for more than a year and a half<\/a>, and even faced the issue of being taxed on income they were not able to receive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n