4chan, the anonymous social media site, is refusing to pay daily fines issued by Ofcom under the Online Safety Act after the regulator said 4chan was not complying with information requests.

Ofcom investigated 4chan as part of its standard investigations into large platforms before issuing 4chan with a “provisional notice of contravention” for not complying with two information requests.

The regulator was investigating the forum to see if it was in compliance with the act, which requires large platforms to prevent the spread of harmful and illegal content.

Under the Online Safety Act, Ofcom can issue daily fines on firms that are non-compliant – this has been issued on top of the £20,000 fine already issued to the platform.

However, 4chan is fighting the fine, with its lawyers telling the BBC that Ofcom’s notices hold “no legal obligations in the United States,” according to Preston Byrne, the managing partner of Byrne & Storm law firm, who told the BBC that 4chan has not broken any US laws and will therefore pay no penalty.

The firm’s lawyers are taking a contentious stance on the rule, saying that, as 4cahn is incorporated in the US, it is protected against UK law.

This tends not to be true in many different respects, however – US tech companies are regularly fined for operating out with legal compliance laws under foreign governments, like the EU and the UK. The UK may struggle to issue the fine, however, as 4chan does not own assets or conduct any of its operations in the UK.

“American businesses do not surrender their First Amendment rights because a foreign bureaucrat sends them an email,” the law firms Byrne & Storm and Coleman Law said in a statement posted on X.

“Under settled principles of US law, American courts will not enforce foreign penal fines or censorship codes.

“If necessary, we will seek appropriate relief in US federal court to confirm these principles.”

The law firms go on to say that the Trump administration has been called on to protect US companies from “extraterritorial censorship mandates.”

Ofcom does stipulate that the Online Safety Act only requires services to protect UK users, as that is what their jurisdiction relies on.

While many freedom of speech advocates have brought up concerns regarding the Online Safety Act, requiring information from platforms regarding their safeguarding methods is one of the less controversial aspects of the law.

4chan’s users are anonymous, making regulation on the site all the more complicated. The platform has been rife with controversy as a haven for hate groups and for the proliferation of misogynistic and other hateful content.

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Recently, the Trump administration has pushed back on the UK and EU’s regulations on US companies.

Most notably, US officials and senators have recently called on the UK to back down from its controversial order to Apple to create a backdoor to its encryption technology, which the UK has allegedly done according to US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard.

Even though this order was highly controversial, the Trump administration has hit out at the UK and EU for other laws and fines against US tech giants concerning AI regulations and data protection. During the President’s tumultuous tirade of tariffs, the EU’s regulation of big tech came under intense scrutiny by the US, and was used as a bargaining chip for better trade relations.

In his discussions with Prime Minister Keir Starmer regarding UK-US trade deals, Trump specifically mentioned regulations on large American tech corporations as a point of contention, with Starmer reportedly offering the corporations better tax cuts in exchange for fairer trade deals with the US.

Trump and his allies have been notable supporters of large tech companies since he came into office again, following a £1 million donation from Mark Zuckerberg in the later stages of his campaign. Major tech leaders – including Elon Musk of X and Tesla, Tim Cook of Apple, Mark Zuckerberg of Meta, and Jeff Bezos of Amazon, were present at his second inauguration.

4chan’s calling on the President is therefore a strong political choice, though rather unprecedented – at least in the eye of the public – reflecting the strange and strained tides of international relations and big tech regulation.