Local MP Maria Miller has welcomed today’s publication by the UK Government of the draft of the new Online Safety Bill. Under the draft Online Safety Bill, major regulation of the internet will be introduced for the first time, requiring social networks to tackle illegal content on their service and clearly set out in their terms what content is and is not acceptable.
The Bill will include measures to protect children and young people against a comprehensive range of online harms, and hold social media sites and apps to account over the spreading of illegal and harmful content. Ofcom will be given the power to fine companies failing to comply with the new duty of care.
Commenting on the announcement, Maria said, "The publication of this landmark Bill is really welcome, and demonstrates this Government’s firm commitment to making the UK the safest place to be online. The Bill has the potential to be a world-leading piece of legislation, setting the bar high for other nations; in order to do this, the Bill must protect those most marginalised and vulnerable online, including children and women."
“Regulation online is a constructive step forward, but when it comes to outlawing the distribution of intimate sexual images without consent we need stronger and clearer laws that apply not only to social media platforms, but to emails and text to, where 1 in 5 such images is distributed. “
“The law on intimate-image based abuse is currently a patchwork of offences and out-of-date for modern use, so alongside the government’s Online Safety Bill, I want to see a strengthening of the criminal law to make it unlawful to take, make or share (or threaten to share) intimate sexual images without consent and to give victims a clear right to anonymity as is the case now with a range of sexual abuse crimes.”
"This Bill must also directly deal with the problem of anonymous social media accounts, which generate the majority of abuse and misinformation online. People should always have the option to be incognito on social media, but social media users should be able to choose to filter out unverified anonymous accounts. I support a twin-track system: giving social media users the right to create a verified account by supplying a piece of personal identification and the right to filter out unverified accounts. This would continue to offer protection to those, for example whistleblowers, who want to access social media anonymously."
The Online Safety Bill is currently in draft form, and will be scrutinised by a pre-legislative committee before being introduced to the House of Commons.