The government of the United Kingdom on Monday unveiled a proposed set of tough online safety laws which will penalize social media platforms if they fail to protect users from harmful content
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th April, 2019) The government of the United Kingdom on Monday unveiled a proposed set of tough online safety laws which will penalize social media platforms if they fail to protect users from harmful content."In the first online safety laws of their kind, social media companies and tech firms will be legally required to protect their users and face tough penalties if they do not comply," the UK government said in a statement.
The proposal, dubbed the Online Harms White Paper, says that social media firms must abide by mandatory "duty of care" which will require them "to keep their users safe and tackle illegal and harmful activity on their services."
"The regulator will have effective enforcement tools, and we are consulting on powers to issue substantial fines, block access to sites and potentially to impose liability on individual members of senior management," the proposal says.
According to Digital Secretary Jeremy Wright, voluntary actions from industry to tackle online harms "have not been applied consistently or gone far enough."
"Tech can be an incredible force for good and we want the sector to be part of the solution in protecting their users. However those that fail to do this will face tough action. We want the UK to be the safest place in the world to go online, and the best place to start and grow a digital business," he stressed.
In the meantime, the London-based British Computer Society (BCS) believes that UK plans for online safety laws are not enough.
"Blaming social media platforms for failing to keep us safe on the internet is only putting one side of the story. It means that not enough responsibility is being taken by either parents, schools or the government about the wider role of teaching children in how to stay safe," Adam Thilthorpe, Director of External Affairs at BCS, said.
The BSC, which has 68,000 members across 150 countries worldwide, says that it is aim is to lead the IT industry through ethical challenges.
