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 keep children safe online.

Keeping children safe online is a priority for this government. Through the Online Safety Act, children already benefit from the protections of the illegal content duties, and later this month the child safety duties will come into force, providing additional protections. Once in force, services in-scope will be required to protect children from harmful content, including pornography, suicide and self-harm material.

Ofcom – the regulator of the Act – has robust enforcement powers to use should services not comply with their duties. The government continues to consider all options in pursuit of child online safety building on provisions in the Act.