Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what steps his Department is taking to help protect young people from (a) misogynistic behaviour and (b) unrealistic expectations of young women on social media platforms.

The Online Safety Act requires in-scope services to protect users from harmful illegal content, much of which disproportionately affects women and girls. Services must also employ age-appropriate measures to protect children from legal abusive and hateful misogynistic content. User-to-user services and publishers of pornography must also prevent children from encountering online pornography.

Services over the designated threshold will need to remove misogynistic content where it is prohibited in their terms of service. Companies will need to have effective, accessible mechanisms in place for users to be able to report abuse and receive an appropriate response from the platform.

Media literacy helps address online safety issues by raising awareness that online actions have offline consequences, encouraging critical engagement with content and fostering a respectful online environment. Since 2022, the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology has provided almost £3 million in grant funding for a range of media literacy projects. This covered funding for the National Literacy Trust’s ‘Empower’ programme which includes delivering media literacy education with a focus on women and girls’ online experiences to students aged 11-16.