Source · Select Committees · Petitions Committee
Recommendation 15
15
Rejected
We support calls for the Online Safety Bill to include a foundational duty on platforms...
Recommendation
We support calls for the Online Safety Bill to include a foundational duty on platforms to protect users from reasonably foreseeable risks of harm identified in their risk assessments, including harm arising from abusive content that is legal but harmful to adults. We recommend that this should include an explicit expectation that platforms consider how not only content moderation, but also changes to system design and user functionalities, could help mitigate or prevent these risks. (Paragraph 67) Online abuse and the criminal law
Government Response Summary
The government rejects the recommendation for a single foundational duty to protect users from foreseeable harm, arguing it would create an uncertain operating environment. However, it states the Bill already requires service providers to assess risks linked to service design and user functionalities.
Government Response
Rejected
HM Government
Rejected
The government welcomes this recommendation and agrees that it is important that users are given the choice over who they interact with. The government has included new duties in the Bill on Category 1 service providers to give adult users more control over their online experience. The new user verification duty will ensure that Category 1 service providers provide all adult users with the option to verify their identity, should they wish to do so. The recommended forms of identification by which users can verify their identity will be set out through guidance issued by Ofcom. As part of preparing the guidance Ofcom must ensure that the recommended verification measures are accessible to vulnerable users. In preparing the guidance Ofcom must also consult the Information Commissioner, persons with technical expertise, persons representing vulnerable adult users and anyone else they consider appropriate. Alongside the user verification duty sits the new user empowerment duty. The user empowerment duty will ensure that Category 1 service providers provide adult users with the tools to control whether they encounter or interact with unverified users. This includes preventing unverified users from seeing their content or seeing content from an unverified user. In addition, Category 1 service providers, for harmful content that Category 1 services do tolerate, will have to provide users with the tools to control what types of legal but harmful content they see. This could include, for example, content on the discussion of self-harm recovery which may be tolerated on a category one service but which a particular user may not want to see. These two new duties, in combination, will help provide robust protections for adults, including vulnerable users. They will ensure that UK users have more control over who they interact with and what content they see. Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport March 2022