UK introduces exhaustive Online Safety Bill

News today reports on the Online Safety Bill introduced to parliament which includes several major updates, including new laws that will require social media sites and tech firms to prevent users being exposed to harmful content.

Emma Woollcott, Partner and Head of the Reputation Protection and Crisis Management team at Mishcon de Reya commented:

“The Government’s ambitious plans to tackle online harms have taken a significant step forward today with the publication of the Online Safety Bill due imminently. It is clear that careful attention has been paid to feedback from Parliament and wider society on a range of important issues such as anonymity, cyber flashing and revenge porn, hate crime and scam adverts.

“The Bill will need to be carefully scrutinised by Parliament to ensure that it protects victims of online harms, whilst also safeguarding freedom of expression.

“Many commentators have focused on how the Bill will hold the ‘tech giants’ to account, but the established social media platforms and internet search engines have been preparing for this legislation for years. The challenge will come for the some 24,000 (or likely more) businesses caught by the new law, which will need to carry out risk assessments to avoid significant fines and potential criminal penalties.

“It appears a range of new criminal offenses have been added to the Bill, which could find senior managers at such companies criminally liable for destroying evidence, failing to attend or providing false information to Ofcom and/or obstructing the regulator when it enters the company’s offices.”