Offences against Children: Social Media

(asked on 21st January 2019) - View Source

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 15 January 2019 to Question 205952 on Offences against Children: Internet, whether be plans to bring forward proposals for statutory regulation to enforce safety rules on social media platforms.


Answered by
Victoria Atkins Portrait
Victoria Atkins
Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
This question was answered on 29th January 2019

On 7-8 November the Home Secretary co-hosted a Hackathon with Microsoft and the WePROTECT Global Alliance. Leading companies, including Facebook and Snapchat, worked to develop a prototype tool to detect online grooming, which will be provided licence free to small and medium companies worldwide.

The Home Secretary met with the senior leadership of Facebook, Snapchat and other technology companies to urge them to promote the use of the new prototype to tackle potential instances of online grooming.

Since the Hackathon, the Home Office have been engaging with technology companies, including Facebook and Snapchat, and discussing how to fulfil the Home Secretary’s priority asks of the technology industry, as outlined in his speech at the NSPCC on 3 September. While progress has been made on detection and disruption of online grooming, on these platforms and others, significant challenges remain. We continue to work with companies to drive greater transparency on online grooming and foster greater sharing of best practice and technology between companies.

The Home Office is also engaging with key industry stakeholders on the Online Harms White Paper. The White Paper will set out a range of legislative and non-legislative measures detailing how we will tackle online harms and set clear responsibilities for tech companies to keep UK citizens safe online. Protecting children from abuse and exploitation online will be a central component of the White Paper.

Reticulating Splines