We believe the Government's draft Online Safety Bill poses one of the greatest threats to free speech of any law in the UK in living memory. We are calling on the Government to remove provisions within the Bill which specifically target lawful expression.
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The right to free expression is the foundation of our democracy in the UK. The Online Safety Bill does nothing to help police deal with crime online but will force social media companies to act on lawful speech of any type that Ministers choose. The Government has a duty under human rights law to protect free speech and must remove requirements that specifically target lawful speech from the Bill.
Thursday 27th January 2022
The Government is committed to protecting free speech. The Bill contains strong protections for freedom of expression and will not prevent adults from accessing or posting legal content.
Freedom of expression and the media are essential qualities of a flourishing democracy. The Government is committed to maintaining a free and open internet, in line with our democratic values.
One of the overarching principles of our Online Safety framework is to ensure that freedom of expression is protected online. These laws will usher in a new era of accountability for tech companies that will uphold free expression and pluralism online.
Safeguards for freedom of expression have been built in throughout the framework. All in-scope companies will need to consider and implement safeguards for freedom of expression when fulfilling their duties.
Nothing in the Bill requires companies to remove specific lawful content accessed by adults. We recognise that adults have the right to upload and access content that some may find offensive or upsetting. The largest and riskiest services, Category 1 services, will be required to clearly set out how they will deal with legal but harmful content. They must consistently enforce these rules, meaning that they will no longer be able to arbitrarily remove content. Users will have access to effective mechanisms to appeal if they believe that content has been removed unfairly.
Category 1 services will have additional duties to protect democratic and journalistic content. They must consider whether the public interest in seeing some types of content outweighs the potential harm it could cause. They will need to set clear policies up front for how they will treat such content and enforce these consistently.
Category 1 services will also have duties to assess the impact of their safety policies on freedom of expression and to demonstrate the steps they are taking to mitigate this impact. They will need to assess the impact on freedom of expression both when deciding on, and after they have adopted, their safety policies.
The regulator, Ofcom, as a public body, has an obligation under the Human Rights Act not to act in a way which is incompatible with the right to freedom of expression when carrying out its duties. This protects against Ofcom putting in place unnecessary or disproportionate measures that restrict users’ freedom of expression.
If platforms don’t comply with their duties, including their freedom of expression duties, Ofcom can take enforcement action and fine the relevant company up to £18 million or 10% of their global annual revenue.
The Online Safety Bill will reduce the prevalence of illegal content and activity online and create a safer environment in which users feel more able to express their views. This issue was also highlighted by the Joint Committee for Scrutiny of the Online Safety Bill and we are considering if there is anything further that can be done within the Online Safety Bill to support this. There are existing legal frameworks to support police in the identification of online offenders and the criminal justice system will continue to bring criminals to justice.
The government has also invested in specialist investigation teams at regional and national level to provide the relevant knowledge, skills and capabilities for enforcement online. This includes our funding for a Police Online Hate Crime Hub to improve the police response to victims of online hate crime, and our existing Social Media Hub, which brings together a dedicated team of police officers and staff to take action against online material.
Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport