Government’s Online Safety Plan Doesn't go Far Enough to Protect Vulnerable - Swann

In a committee meeting on the Online Safety Act, South Antrim MP Robin Swann raised concerns about the legislations and its potential shortcomings.

During the committee meeting, Mr Swann said:

“I want to express my concern that these changes do not bring into scope small but potentially dangerous platforms, including those that bring about specific, targeted abuse and harms, as well as those that disguise themselves as support for preventing self-harm, suicide and eating disorders, but actually promote that ideology and can cause further harm.”

Under these new regulations, the Government would further regulate online user-to-user services which exceed 34 million monthly UK-users, and search engines with greater than 7 million monthly users in the UK.

 On these points, Mr Swann said,

“The Government have missed an opportunity to correct what they continue to say this statutory instrument addresses.”

Mr Swann described these limits as “a blunt tool” going on to say:

“Reading into the regulations and the explanatory documents shows that the figures are worked out using a six-month mean average, so there is absolutely nothing to prevent one of these platforms, should they want to flout or get below the threshold, from simply delisting or deregistering a number of their users over that six-month rolling period, which would see them fall out of scope of the regulations.”

Concluding, the UUP MP urged committee members to reflect on the purpose of the legislation:

“Previous work on the Online Safety Act considered the level of risk rather than using numbers as a blank term, I encourage the Government, to go back and look at what the legislation is about achieving—protecting our online users.”