Internet: Harassment

(asked on 14th December 2021) - View Source

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to ensure that online platforms are obliged to cooperate with the police and with other platforms to pursue perpetrators of abuse on their platforms.


Answered by
Rachel Maclean Portrait
Rachel Maclean
This question was answered on 21st December 2021

The Online Safety Bill will place duties on companies to take responsibility for the safety of their users. All companies will need to take swift and effective action against criminal online abuse. If platforms don’t fulfil their duties, they could face an investigation and enforcement action.

The Joint Committee on the Draft Online Safety Bill published a report on 14 December, having conducted pre-legislative scrutiny on the draft bill. The report included recommendations on cooperation between platforms and law enforcement in relation to identifying the perpetrators of online abuse. We are currently in the process of considering the recommended changes to the legislation that the committee have proposed, including on this issue.

We are grateful for the committee’s work and we will introduce the Bill as soon as possible, once we have considered their recommendations.

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