The draft Online Safety Bill will be brought before the House of Commons in the UK Parliament today.

When it was introduced in the Queen’s speech on May 11th, 2021, the Online Safety Bill was touted as a way to protect young people and reduce racist abuse online. Since then, the draft legislation has had additional powers added to it.

These include creating a variety of new offences, including hate crimes, the sale of illegal drugs or weapons, the promotion or facilitation of suicide, and cyberflashing. It will force all websites that publish or host pornography to put checks in place to ensure users are 18 years old or over.

In addition, it will regulate online advertising, providing greater powers to tackle misleading adverts and fraud.

The UK government has announced that executives whose companies fail to cooperate with Ofcom’s information requests could now face prosecution or jail time within two months of the bill becoming law, instead of two years as it was previously drafted.

Additional offences on the bill would make senior managers criminally liable for destroying evidence, failing to attend or providing false information in interviews with Ofcom, and for obstructing the regulator when it enters company offices.

Legal but Harmful

Among the bill’s proposals are placing responsibility on social media platforms, search engines and other apps and websites allowing people to post their own content to protect children, tackle illegal activity and uphold their stated terms and conditions.

However, one of today’s amendments will see the Government provide a list of ‘legal but harmful’ content for platforms to remove. This will disincentivise companies from over-policing their platforms of legal content or controversial comments.

Under the proposed legislation, Ofcom will have the power to force non-compliant companies to improve their practices or fine them. This could potentially be up to 10% of their annual global turnover,

The bill includes exemptions for low-risk tech and non-tech businesses with an online presence.

Digital Secretary Nadine Dorries said: “The internet has transformed our lives for the better. It’s connected us and empowered us. But on the other side, tech firms haven’t been held to account when harm, abuse and criminal behaviour have run riot on their platforms. Instead, they have been left to mark their own homework.

“We don’t give it a second’s thought when we buckle our seat belts to protect ourselves when driving. Given all the risks online, it’s only sensible we ensure similar basic protections for the digital age.

“If we fail to act, we risk sacrificing the wellbeing and innocence of countless generations of children to the power of unchecked algorithms.”

Freedom or Safety?

While the Government claims that the bill will strengthen people’s rights to express themselves online, there have been concerns that the legislation will curtail freedom of speech.

Currently, the Online Safety Bill enshrines the right of users to appeal if they feel their post has been taken down unfairly. Furthermore, it requires social media firms to protect journalism and democratic political debate on their platforms – news content will be completely exempt from any regulation under the Bill.

However, even with these provisions, critics have warned that the bill is still far too restrictive. Legal and Policy Officer at Big Brother Watch Mark Johnson said: “The Online Safety Bill is set to rip up the rule book as far as traditional British free speech standards are concerned.

“This is a censor’s charter that will give state backing to big tech censorship on a scale that we have never seen before.”

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Balancing freedom of speech while ensuring vulnerable users are protected from online abuse is one the major issues surrounding the bill.

CEO of fintech Digital Identity Net Martin Wilson commented: “The Online Safety Bill is a step towards making the internet a safer, collaborative place for all users, rather than leaving it in its current ‘Wild West’ state, where many people are vulnerable to abuse, fraud, violence and worse.

“While this type of legislation is being discussed in different countries, the UK is now leading the charge and its approach is consistent to those being considered around the world.

“There is some language that could be tightened and issues which need ironing out. The bill needs to be more specific about the balance between freedom of speech and how people are protected from online abuse. Furthermore, fraud which is a huge and rapidly growing problem in the UK, needs to be at the front and centre of this bill.”

He added: “One of the recent, many, announcements was the introduction of user verification on social media. But it isn’t clear what verified accounts look like and its suggestions on how people can verify their identity are flawed. The likes of passports and sending a text to a mobile simply aren’t fit for the digital age.

“We need to look towards new technologies which let people prove who they are without laborious and potentially unreliable manual identity checks. Such digital identity systems already exist in countries such as Belgium, Norway and Sweden and have seen strong adoption and usage for a range of use cases.”

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