Online Safety

Judith Cummins Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lisa Nandy)]

With permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I would like to make a statement on the next steps that this Government will be taking to protect children online. This Government’s ambition is to be the world leader in shaping an online environment that works for us. We intend to be an active Government that will help to create an online environment that is not just safe, but enabling and empowering. That starts with fixing the fundamentals, and this House can expect to see us acting more quickly and more decisively from now on to keep us safe online.

In December last year, the Government published their action plan to tackle violence against women and girls. I would like to put on record my gratitude to my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall) and my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Yardley (Jess Phillips), who are here today, for their clear ambition and determination that the UK would become the first country in the world where it would be impossible for children to take, share or view nude images online. In June, the Government challenged industry on a three-month timeline to work with us and set out road maps for how they would strengthen device-level protections for children with a view to preventing children from taking, sharing or viewing nude images on phones and tablets.

Today I can update the House on the progress that has been made and the next steps that this Government will take to protect children. Since June, officials from my Department and the Home Office have overseen an unprecedented work programme with Apple and Google, working with senior leaders and engineers to explore new ways of preventing child sexual abuse and strengthening protections for children online. I can report that, following this engagement, Apple and Google have provided the Government with significant commitments. Both companies have developed meaningful changes at operating level to make it harder for children to share nude imagery. We have seen progress in the blocking, not blurring, of nude imagery on underage devices, and this builds on significant milestones already in implementation, including Apple’s roll-out earlier this year of operating system-level age assurance and tighter safety features preventing a child from receiving or sharing nude imagery on iMessage or FaceTime. These proposals are a step in the right direction. However, the truth is that they do not meet the scale of this crisis.

Children are facing unacceptable levels of sexual harm online. They are being groomed, coerced and manipulated into creating and sharing intimate images across online services. The Internet Watch Foundation believes that 91% of these images are self-generated by children. They are used for blackmail and sexual extortion. Each year, around 9,000 child sexual abuse offences involve an online element, with under-18s the subject of almost a quarter of online blackmail. I challenge anyone to listen to those statistics and come to the conclusion that the internet is a safe place for kids or that the Government should not get involved.

This is not the first time in history that new forms of technology have up-ended society, but what is unique to this moment is that the technology has been developed almost exclusively in the private sphere. I am clear that there is a central role for Government in shaping that technology for good, not just to protect from harm—although that is a basic obligation of any Government—but to enable and empower.

When it comes to the development of technology that affects our lives, we are not neutral. In no other walk of life would we tolerate this crisis harming our children, and we will not tolerate it online. For too long, technology companies have failed to protect children from some of the worst harms. To be frank, I am not prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt that progress will continue at the pace we need it to, while harm is being done now.

For that reason, I make the following announcements to the House. First, the Government today commit to introducing primary legislation to require major tech platforms to build in device-level protections for children. We will introduce the legislation to Parliament as soon as we can, recognising the urgency of the issue while ensuring that we work with colleagues across the House to get it right. We want to see movement on this quickly. If platforms in scope of the draft legislation develop and implement technical solutions while our work is ongoing, we will of course reassess whether legislation is necessary. We know that this is a sector that can, when required, innovate at an extraordinary pace when the chips are down.

Alongside the measures on devices, the Government will, as soon as possible, require that apps used by children prevent children from accessing or sharing nudity. We will explore what legislation is needed to implement that commitment, with a view to moving as quickly as possible. This will ensure that the whole ecosystem changes, tackling the means by which children are most often abused or groomed online. Put simply, we will give tech companies the chance to lead; we will not give them the chance to lag.

These measures, taken together, will make Britain the first country in the world to go this far, and a world leader in online safety. The message we are sending to tech companies is clear: planning must now become implementation, and progress must translate into protections that make a real difference to children’s lives. I give my commitment to all Members of this House, and to anybody listening out there in the country who has been desperately worried about what is happening to our children online, that when it comes to children’s safety, we are not, and never will be, bystanders. I commend this statement to the House.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

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[Lisa Nandy]

Once again, I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend and thank her so much for all her support both when we worked together in government and since; she really is a class act.

I am not in a position to give a firm timetable for the measures that my right hon. Friend mentioned, but I will commit to coming back to her with one, because I understand that Members across the House will want to know that there will be no delay in taking action on those things. We are also looking at a more comprehensive system, very much in the spirit of the reforms that she set out earlier this year, and we intend to move quickly on that without delay. I do not think we will be in a position to do the whole package by the end of the year, but I would be very disappointed if we had not made enormous progress by then, including meeting the commitments that she set out. I would be particularly disappointed if, by this time next year, we did not have a much more robust and comprehensive package of measures in place.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Anna Sabine (Frome and East Somerset) (LD)]

When the last Prime Minister gave tech giants three months to voluntarily implement technology that would prevent children from taking and sharing nude images, the Lib Dems were clear that we should not rely on the good will of companies that have repeatedly put profit before children’s safety, and I am pleased to see today that the Government agree with us. The need for action cannot be clearer. In 2024, 91% of online child sexual abuse reports involved self-generated content from children online, and last year there was an 8% rise in child sexual abuse image offences across the UK. These are not just statistics; they are real children being exploited online.

This is a serious problem that urgently demands serious legislation. That is why the Lib Dems welcome today’s announcement of primary legislation that will require device-level and app-level protections for children online. However, this House has heard the phrase “as soon as possible” many times before. I hear what the Secretary of State is saying about a timetable for legislation, but what she said earlier slightly hinted that what the tech giants were doing might affect the progress of the legislation, so I seek reassurance that legislation will be ploughing forward regardless of what those companies are doing.

The Lib Dems are supportive of legislation to protect children from abuse online, but protection cannot come at the expense of privacy. Any legislation that is brought in must be accompanied by guarantees that technology will be highly effective and preserve privacy. Can the Secretary of State confirm that that will be the case?

Too often, the Government have left tech companies to mark their own homework. I am glad that today they have decided enough is enough, but this announcement could have been made three months ago. If we truly want to protect our children, we need a Government who act before harm is done, not a Government who wait until it is too late. I hope that will be the case going forward, as the Secretary of State has intimated.

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[Lisa Nandy]

My hon. Friend makes a typically well informed and well thought-out point. I thank her not just for her support, but for all the work she has done to ensure that we have got here. I know that she is appreciated not just by me, but by many of the incredible, brave families who I have had the privilege to get to know over the last few weeks and who have wanted to see action in this space for a very long time. I pay tribute to those families as well as to her. She has made an important point about working with Governments and other partners across the world to keep children safe. That is the promise of the UN convention on the rights of the child. A child harmed anywhere means that children can be harmed everywhere, and we have to take that really seriously.

My hon. Friend should be encouraged—and I suspect that she is—by the fact that many Governments are now acting more decisively. They are stepping up and recognising that the development and regulation of new forms of technology cannot be left to the private sector alone. There is a clear role for active, empowering Governments working in this space, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray) and I have not hesitated to reach out to like-minded Governments across the world to see what more we can do together.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call the Chair of the Select Committee.

[Dame Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

I also warmly welcome this announcement. The sheer number of young people whose lives have been impacted by this issue is a damning indictment of a collective failure to keep children safe. Let us not forget that major tech companies have the capability to implement device-level controls but have chosen not to do so. As far as I am concerned, it is simply unforgivable that those companies innovate quickly on new products, yet so slowly on children’s safety. Given Ofcom’s sluggish implementation of the Online Safety Act 2023, can the Secretary of State explain to me how compliance with this policy will be monitored, and what sanctions will be available to address non-compliance?

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[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

Order. May I remind Members that these exchanges will be followed by a ten-minute rule motion and a debate on the Health Bill? I am therefore aiming to end them at about 4.30 pm.

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[Lisa Nandy]

I thank my hon. Friend for that point. I think the views of his constituents in Harlow are probably mirrored in every constituency across the country. I want to be really clear about our message today to parents who have been struggling with this matter for so long: you are not on your own. We believe that we are as responsible for keeping their children safe as they are, and we are stepping up to take the necessary action, whether that is through support, advice and training for parents and children, or through the reforms and measures that I have outlined today—we are the first country in the world to do so, and I strongly suspect that we will not be the last.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

For the final question, I call Tom Hayes.

[Tom Hayes (Bournemouth East) (Lab)]

Democracies face a choice between allowing the online world to be a wild west or stepping in, so I really welcome this Government’s decision to regulate the tech titans that have been putting profit before protection. I have families in my constituency who have been deeply affected by traumas online that have repeated what has been experienced in the real world, and they would really welcome the chance to meet the Secretary of State at the Department. Would she meet them with me so that they can share their experiences and help to shape the legislation as it goes forward?