The International Forum for Responsible Media Blog
The government’s online safety bill, a reform years in the making, will now become law. Among the bill’s key aims is to ensure it is more difficult for young people (under the age of 18) to access content that is considered harmful – such as pornography and content that promotes suicide or eating disorders. Continue reading
The Online Safety Bill will shortly become law in the UK as soon as it receives Royal Assent. The legislation will introduce a new regulatory regime for online platforms and search engines which target the UK, imposing wide-ranging obligations on in-scope services with serious consequences for non-compliance. Continue reading
The UK’s long-debated online safety bill (OSB) has been approved by the House of Lords, clearing the way for it to become law. But it has pitted the government, which proposed the bill, against tech companies that provide secure messaging services. Critics say it will allow authorities in the UK to compel service providers to break users’ encryption. Continue reading
Assailed from all quarters for being not tough enough, for being too tough, for being fundamentally misconceived, for threatening freedom of expression, for technological illiteracy, for threatening privacy, for excessive Ministerial powers, or occasionally for the sin of not being some other Bill entirely – and yet enjoying almost universal cross-party Parliamentary support – the UK’s Online Safety Bill is now limping its way through the House of Lords. It starts its Committee stage on 19 April 2023. Continue reading
The Online Safety Bill was reintroduced to Parliament late last year, with new amendments receiving scrutiny in the House of Commons in December, before the bill entered the House of Lords in January. Continue reading
From what feels like time immemorial the UK government has paraded its proposed online harms legislation under the banner of ‘What is Illegal Offline is Illegal Online’. As a description of what is now the Online Safety Bill, the slogan is ill-fitting. The Bill contains nothing that extends to online behaviour a criminal offence that was previously limited to offline. Continue reading
Any commentary upon legislation in progress risks rapidly becoming outdated: an occupational hazard to which this piece is by no means immune. Continue reading
Part 3: Criticism
In a rare show of national unity, disapproval of the OSB has spanned both ends of the political spectrum. Alongside criticism from the Labour culture minister, Conservative politicians have also weighed in on the ‘legal but harmful’ debate. Thinktanks and non-profit groups have likewise been apprehensive.
A number of Bills proposed by the recent Conservative governments have sparked controversy among commentators: among them, the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill, the Retained EU Law Bill, and the ‘British’ Bill of Rights Bill. Taking its place in the rogues’ gallery is the Online Safety Bill (OSB)[pdf]. Continue reading
The traditional press has two roles, one as a check on public figures, and another as a form of entertainment. Increasingly, as Franklin argues: Continue reading
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