Safety online

Today the government set out a new standard for safety online which is intended to provide the most comprehensive approach yet seen in the UK to online regulation and ensure that the internet is a safer place children and vulnerable users. 

  • The proposed Online Harms Bill – to be introduced next year – in intended to ensure that Britain enters a new age of accountability for tech companies, protecting children and vulnerable users, restoring trust in this industry, and enshrining in law safeguards for free speech.
     
  • The government is setting out standards designed to ensure that social media sites, websites, apps and other services will need to remove and limit the spread of illegal content such as child sexual abuse, terrorist material and content which could encourage suicide or self-harm. Tech platforms will need to do more to protect children from being exposed to harmful content or activity such as grooming, bullying and pornography.
     
  • Ofcom is now confirmed as the regulator with the power to fine companies failing in their duty of care up to £18 million or ten per cent of annual global turnover, whichever is higher. The legislation also includes provisions to impose criminal sanctions on senior managers, meaning that tech companies must put public safety first or face the consequences.
     
  • This new framework is designed to be proportionate and practical, and to ensure that  unnecessary burdens are not imposed on small businesses while setting out robust "rules of the road" for large digital businesses so we can seize the brilliance of modern technology to improve our lives.

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