Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what consideration they have given to Ofcom regulating the social media platform YouTube in the same way as licensed media broadcasters.

The remit of Ofcom, the independent regulator and competition authority for the UK communications industries, is set out in the Communications Act 2003. It has wide-ranging powers across broadcasting, telecoms and post.

Government favours a self-regulatory, multi-stakeholder approach to the internet, and seeks to work collaboratively with key partners.

We are considering a range of options to counter internet harms as part of Internet Safety Strategy, published on 11 October. We recently held a consultation exercise on the measures in the Strategy, which included questions on a social media code of practice, annual social media transparency reports and a social media levy. We will publish a response to the consultation in due course.