Asked by: Christine Jardine (Liberal Democrat - Edinburgh West)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the Online Safety Act 2023 on (a) small websites, (b) personal blogs and (c) community forums.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
Under the Online Safety Act, in-scope user-to-user and search services must risk assess for content that is illegal and harmful to children. Ofcom, the independent regulator for this regime, set out what steps small, low-risk providers need to take to fulfil their duties following their risk assessment. When implementing these duties, Ofcom is legally required to ensure burdens on providers are proportionate to their risk factors, size, and capacity. Ofcom recently launched an online digital toolkit, aimed at helping smaller services with compliance (https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/illegal-and-harmful-content/ofcom-launches-digital-safety-toolkit-for-online-services/