Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, if he will have discussions with Meta on removing monkey abuse content from its platforms.

Government ministers and officials regularly discuss online safety matters with stakeholders including online platforms such as Meta.

Under the Online Safety Act’s ‘illegal content duties’, social media platforms including Meta have duties to implement measures to tackle animal abuse content and remove it from their services. Ofcom is the UK’s independent regulator for online safety responsible for regulating services and taking enforcement action as appropriate. It has published recommendations for how providers should fulfil their illegal content duties in codes of practice and documentation. These include specific provisions about animal abuse content. These duties took effect on 17 March.