Internet

(asked on 7th July 2015) - View Source

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what proportion of internet customers have made an active choice on filters.


Answered by
Lord Vaizey of Didcot Portrait
Lord Vaizey of Didcot
This question was answered on 23rd July 2015

This Government continues to prioritise actions to improve children's safety online. Under the auspices of the UK Council for Child Internet Safety (UKCCIS), Government meets key partners on a quarterly basis to drive and oversee progress.

In the Autumn, Ofcom will report on progress made by BT, Sky, Talk Talk and Virgin to roll-out family friendly filters. These four ISPs provide internet services to around 90% of the UK's fixed-line customers. Ofcom has already delivered three reports on progress in this area, and will be delivering a final report later this year. Whilst we await Ofcom's findings, we understand from the ISPs that collectively, over 95% of customers have now made an active choice on filters, or had filters applied to their accounts.

We estimate that around 90% of public wifi is provided by six providers, all of whom apply filters which block adult content and illegal child sexual abuse material by default in areas that children are likely to be unsupervised by a parent. The recently-established UKCCIS Filters Group, which evolved out of a previous group dedicated to overblocking, will keep Government informed as to progress in this area, and is continuing to look into ways to address concerns about over-blocking.

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