Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, whether he has plans to instruct Ofcom to conduct an impact assessment of the decision to designate end-to-end encryption as a risk factor in their Illegal Harms Codes of Practice and illegal content risk assessment guidance.

The Online Safety Act does not ban any service design, including end-to-end-encryption. Under the Act, providers must risk assess the design of their service. Ofcom can only recommend measures in codes of practice that are technically feasible. Separately, Ofcom has powers to direct companies to develop and deploy accredited and accurate technology to identify and remove child sexual abuse material on private communications, but only when all other measures have not adequately addressed the risk.