Online Safety Act 2023: Platform Categorisation
(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)
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Baroness Morgan of Cotes
To ask His Majesty’s Government why Ofcom’s register of categorised services contains no platform categorised by reference to risk or functionality alone, when the Online Safety Act 2023 permits it; and why small, high-harm platforms, including those hosting antisemitic and suicide-related content, remain outside Category 1.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade and Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Baroness Lloyd of Effra) (Lab)
My Lords, Ofcom assessed and designated services on the register, in line with the regulations passed by Parliament, in February 2025. These set category 1 threshold conditions, combining user numbers and functionalities. Category 1 is intended for platforms with a minimum of 7 million monthly UK users, reflecting their reach and influence. Smaller services are required to tackle illegal content, including suicide, self-harm and antisemitic content, that meets the legal threshold and to protect children from harmful content.
Baroness Morgan of Cotes (Non-Afl)
I thank the Minister very much for her Answer, but the real reason is that, in 2025, then Ministers chose to accept Ofcom’s advice to categorise online platforms on the basis of user numbers alone. Do current Ministers now accept that Ofcom would have been better able, for example, to block a notorious suicide forum, to tackle platforms promoting hate-filled antisemitic content, or those recruiting people for activities hostile to the United Kingdom, if it had followed what this House legislated for in 2023? If Ministers had pushed back on Ofcom’s advice and instead required it to categorise platforms on the basis of functionality or size, as the House wanted, would that have given Ministers that flexibility?
Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)
Categorisation, as the noble Baroness knows, does not determine whether a service is regulated or subject to enforcement by Ofcom. The Government considered options to categorise small but risky services, including those proposed by many thoughtful people on this complicated issue, but ultimately a workable and robust condition for capturing small but risky services was not found. I emphasise that the Government share the significant concerns about small but risky services, such as those that exist purely to stoke hate and division. Ofcom has established the Small but Risky Services Taskforce. It has monitored and carried out active engagement with the providers of 14 services that represent a significant risk of harm to children, from harmful content they host or disseminate. A number of those have geo-blocked the UK as a result, but the Government keep the effectiveness of the Online Safety Act under review and will not hesitate to take further action where there is clear evidence it is needed.
Viscount Colville of Culross (CB)
My Lords, currently, the Online Safety Act requires platforms to conduct suitable and sufficient risk assessments but does not legally require platforms to take action to address the risks identified in these assessments. Does the Minister think that the OSA should be amended to deal with that problem?
Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)
The implementation of the Online Safety Act is something the Government are highly focused on. We have asked Ofcom to look at capabilities; the chair of Ofcom is looking at capabilities around supervision and enforcement. We are taking further measures to protect children, with the restricting of social media companies providing services to under-16s. We are very live to the effectiveness of the Online Safety Act. As the Secretary of State and others have said, where we find evidence that more action is needed, we will take it.
Baroness Parminter (LD)
My Lords, pro-anorexia online forums promote extremely dangerous content, exacerbating eating disorders, yet Ofcom has chosen not to take powers to tackle these pernicious sites, despite knowing that anorexia has the highest mortality rate of all eating disorders. Are the Government reviewing how Ofcom is using the powers that this Parliament gave it to tackle small, high-harm eating disorder forums, and if it is not, will it commit to doing so?
Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)
As I mentioned, the Government share the significant concerns about small but risky services. The Ofcom taskforce is working to ensure compliance with the Online Safety Act, focusing on platforms hosting priority harm content such as CSAM; hate and terror content; suicide, self-harm and eating disorder forums; and violence against women and girls. That is a very important focus of activity. As I also mentioned, this is something that we expect Ofcom to enforce robustly. Ofcom has the Government’s full backing to use its enforcement powers, and the chair of Ofcom is undertaking a review of Ofcom’s enforcement capabilities and powers. The Government are in discussion about what more needs to be done here.
Lord Watts (Lab)
My Lords, is it not the case that, once again, Ofcom is hopeless, and we need to review its role? Unless we have an effective regulator, things such as this will happen on a regular basis. We need to do something about the poor standard of regulators in this country.
Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)
Ensuring that there is a safe, digital experience for citizens and young people in this country, as my noble friend alludes to, is absolutely essential, and we expect robust enforcement of the Online Safety Act. We welcome the capabilities review commissioned by Sir Ian Cheshire, the new chair of Ofcom, which is expected to conclude this autumn. We expect the review to identify practical improvements needed to strengthen the pace and impact of Ofcom’s enforcement function. Enforcement goes hand in hand with the further measures the Government will bring in to regulate the online environment for young people.
The Earl of Effingham (Con)
My Lords, it is clear that smaller platforms are causing disproportionate harm to society. We supported the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, with his regret amendment in February 2025 on, quite rightly, regulating these smaller platforms, in which the Contents had it. Do the Government now accept that it was a serious mistake to resist the will of the House?
Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)
Small but risky services are regulated under the Online Safety Act; they are subject to the duties around illegal content and harm for children. It is very important that those duties are abided by; it is very important, as I mentioned before, that Ofcom enforces with a focus on those services that are disseminating, or creating the environment for, such harm. It is something that we absolutely back.
The Lord Bishop of Gloucester
My Lords, can the Minister comment on how the exclusion of small, high-harm platforms from category 1 supports the Government’s violence against women and girls strategy, given concerns that online abuse, coercion and the spread of misogynistic content often occur on very niche platforms, with relatively small user bases?
Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)
Small services are subject to the illegal content and child safety duties. Ofcom absolutely must enforce those duties where there is evidence that services are not abiding by them. That is one reason we have asked Sir Ian Cheshire to take forward his review of Ofcom’s capabilities. It is important that the online space and the offline space are safe for women and girls and that illegal content is clamped down on.
Lord Clement-Jones (LD)
My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for his reference, but I commend the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, for her work on this. I am not surprised that she has raised this again. When she tabled an amendment to the Online Safety Bill, we all thought that this categorisation matter was sorted. Will the Government now firmly commit to a fixed date for reviewing the categorisation thresholds, informed by evidence of harm rather than user numbers, so that this is not left adrift until the statutory review of the Act?
Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)
The focus when taking forward the categorisation duties is to ensure that those duties come into force in 2027. Let me return to the point that I think everyone in this House agrees with: small but risky services should not provide illegal content or harm to children, and Ofcom should take the necessary action to enforce the duties under the Act.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB)
My Lords, how is Ofcom working with the consumer council to look at the control of so-called toys targeted at children as young as three, which have AI responses in them? They are linked to the internet and can give really disgusting, highly sexual answers when children, from the age of three onwards, pose even simple questions.
Baroness Lloyd of Effra (Lab)
Obviously, we must keep examples such as that in mind. I would prefer to write to the noble Baroness to answer her question, as it crosses a number of activities and regulations. We are taking action to restrict children’s access to services that provide the kind of harm that she mentions. I will follow up with her afterwards.