Asked by: Baroness Manzoor (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask His Majesty's Government what action they are taking to ensure that artificial intelligence labs prevent chatbots from discussing suicide with teenagers.
Answered by Lord Vallance of Balham - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
Every death by suicide is a tragedy and the government is deeply concerned about the role that online content can play.
Services in scope of the Online Safety Act have duties to protect all users from illegal suicide content and protect children from harmful content that encourages, promotes, or provides instructions for suicide. This includes regulated AI-generated content.
The government keeps all legislation under review and will not hesitate to strengthen the law, where required, to protect children.
Asked by: Baroness Manzoor (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask His Majesty's Government what actions they are taking to reduce the use of electronic devices such as tablets and smartphones for preschool children and babies; and how they are alerting new parents of the possible dangers for preschool children and babies overusing these devices.
Answered by Baroness Jones of Whitchurch
Ofcom has duty to promote media literacy to help the public understand the nature and impact of where harmful content and online behaviour affects certain groups.
The Online Safety Act also requires user-to-user and search services likely to be accessed by children to risk assess their service and provide safety measures for child users of all age groups, including early years. In its draft child safety risk assessment guidance, Ofcom has identified age as a risk factor, listing 0-5 years as an age group for which it expects services to consider the age-related risks based on the developmental stage of the children.