Digital Economy

Stephen Doughty Excerpts

Monday 17th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

I follow my hon. Friend’s logic. That was the conclusion that Ofcom reached. It is definitely worth considering the recommendation that he and my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) have made on reviewing the law on viewing pornography in a public place.

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am sure that there is consensus across the House about protecting young people under the age of 18 from illegal or inappropriate material. What steps are being taken to ensure that, in any of the regulations or any of the wider efforts the Government are taking, we do not accidentally prevent young people from accessing age-appropriate material about sex and relationships education? I am aware of material for young lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people on YouTube and other platforms that has been erroneously caught up in age filters and other restrictions. That prevents young people from finding out in a healthy and age-appropriate way about their sexuality and the key things they need to understand as they are growing up.

[Margot James]

The hon. Gentleman makes some very good points. I am aware of some of the cases to which he refers. When I explain the detail of the regulations, it should reassure him that we are seeking to catch the commercial provision of pornography on sites where at least two thirds of the content is of an adult nature. I think that should allay his concerns. However, we should keep the issue he raises closely under review.

--- Later in debate ---

[Margot James]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on the work that he has done while chairing that important body, the UK Council for Child Internet Safety. I have already made clear in my answer to my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke, the Chair of the Select Committee, that we do recognise that these regulations are a first step. Although we have high expectations of what they can achieve, we are fully aware that they do not go as far as to be able to satisfy the vast majority of our concerns where social media platforms are concerned, where the majority of content is not pornographic.

I would like to reassure the House, however, that I do believe that these regulations will be more effective than my hon. Friend fears, because they will cover sites that make pornography available free of charge. As he rightly points out, the majority of young people access pornography without paying for the service. However, if they access it from a site that is predominantly pornographic and is offering a pornographic service on a commercial basis, then, whether it is free of charge or paid for, the regulations will capture both. I would like to reassure him that these regulations will bring into scope the sites about which he is concerned that currently provide these services free of charge.

My hon. Friend will also be reassured to know, when I go on to explain a little more about the actual process of age verification, that it is not simply a matter of being able to offer a credit card. The rigour of age verification provision will be stricter than that. That will also help to counter the growing trend of young people accessing pornography before they attain the age of 18.

[Stephen Doughty]

Further to the comments by my colleague on the Home Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), we have raised a series of concerns with social media companies and other technology companies about access to inappropriate, violent or extreme content, as well as the content that we are discussing today. Will the Minister and the Government look much more closely at peer-to-peer sharing sites like Snapchat and closed messaging groups on Instagram, Kik and other messaging sites? It is my understanding, from speaking to a lot of young people in my constituency, that that is where a lot of this content is. No age verification goes on, and it is simply done in encrypted sharing. Some of it is self-generated content where people are doing revenge porn, sexting and sharing types of images that not only constitute committing an offence because they are creating child pornography, but are well outside the scope of what one would find on a commercial site. Will she reassure us that serious work will be undertaken to look at that area?

[Margot James]

I can reassure the hon. Gentleman that serious work is being undertaken as we speak, as we prepare the online harms White Paper. We are looking at encryption within the context of that White Paper. He will appreciate the difficulties of privacy versus the public need to reduce the exposure of young people to pornographic material. We are looking at this very seriously. We will be bringing forward the White Paper in the new year and will welcome his input on that.

We have set a threshold of 30% to ensure proportionality where material is made available free of charge. Thus there is an exemption for people making available pornographic content on a website where it makes up under one third of that content. This will ensure that websites that do not derive a significant proportion of their overall commercial benefit from pornography are not regarded in these regulations as commercial pornographic websites. Nevertheless, should a website or app be marketed as making available pornographic material, a person making such material available on that site will be considered to be making it available on a commercial basis even if it constitutes less than one third of the total. This is a proportionate way to introduce the new policy.

I am confident that these measures represent the most effective way to commence this important new policy, but our Department will of course keep it under review. Indeed, as I said, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will be reporting on the regulatory framework within 12 to 18 months of commencement of the regulations. In addition, as I just mentioned in response to the hon. Gentleman, the forthcoming online harms White Paper will provide us with another opportunity to review the wider context of this policy.

In conjunction, we have laid two pieces of British Board of Film Classification guidance—first, on age verification arrangements and, secondly, on ancillary service providers. The first piece of guidance sets out the criteria by which the BBFC will assess whether a person has met the requirements of section 14 of the Digital Economy Act 2017 to ensure that pornographic material is not normally accessible to those under 18. The criteria mandate four things: an effective control mechanism at the point of access to verify that a user is aged 18 or over; strict requirements on age verification data; a requirement to ensure that revisits to a site do not permit the bypassing of age verification controls; and the prevention of non-human operators—for example, bots—from exercising the age-verification regime.