The mooted legislation, launched on Monday in the Online Harms white paper, covers any website that “allows users to share or discover user-generated content, or interact with each other online”, a definition which potentially covers vast tranches of the internet.
As well as social media companies and discussion forums, any site with comment sections, crowdsourced reviews or individual user profile pages falls under that definition, encompassing everything from online news sites to video game stores.
The regulation imposes a “duty of care” on affected sites, holding them liable for restricting “behaviours which are harmful but not necessarily illegal”. Those sites which don’t meet that duty of care can be fined, their senior managers can be held criminally liable, or the regulator can demand the site be blocked entirely.
Critics from across the political spectrum have warned the legislation could threaten freedom of speech. Jim Killock, the executive director of the Open Rights Group, said: “The government’s proposals would create state regulation of the speech of millions of British citizens. We have to expect that the duty of care will end up widely drawn, with serious implications for legal content that is deemed potentially risky, whether it really is nor not.”
On Monday, government ministers sought to reassure critics. Sajid Javid, the home secretary, told the Guardian that “press freedom is absolutely sacrosanct in this country” and that “there is nothing in this white paper that challenges that in any way whatsoever”.
Online harms white paper: could regulation kill innovation?
Earlier, Jeremy Wright, the culture secretary, promised the government’s plans to regulate online harms would not descend into “North Korean-style censorship”, even though the government was planning to introduce new powers to allow regulators to block companies from operating in the UK....read more>>>...
