amplifiers appeal to the Government to make further changes to the Online Safety Bill warns that in its current form, proposed internet security laws “are about to become unworkable.”
In a letter sent to culture secretary Nadine Dorries and technology secretary Chris Philp, the group of 16 organizations say the bill is currently targeting the wrong areas of regulation.
They argue that it currently “focuses too much on regulating what individual people can say online, rather than getting to the root of the problem and tackling the systems and algorithms of tech companies that promote and amplify malicious content.”
“As a result, it risks being the worst of both worlds: not keeping us safe, while also threatening freedom of expression,” the letter says.
It has been signed by the heads of a range of campaign groups, including Hope Not Hate, Fair Vote UK and the 5Rights Foundation.
The online security law is currently making its way through parliament and the government has published a series of initial proposed amendments to the law, including further tackling Russian and other state-sponsored disinformation and giving Ofcom more powers to require companies to take more action. undertake to detect and address child sexual abuse content, including on encrypted services.
But the campaigners have called for a number of further changes, including measures to strengthen freedom of expression and the protection of rights, better protect people from marginalized backgrounds and expand transparency requirements for companies to limit access to data for researchers and improve academics.
In addition, they warn that there are “dangerous loopholes” in the bill that need to be closed and are calling for an amendment to bring paid advertising within the scope of the bill, arguing that extensive research shows that content in advertising is “the largest harm online”.
They also advocate for changes to future-proof the regulation, such as changing the way platforms are defined – doing so based on risk rather than size, and standardizing the risk assessments and specific tasks that companies must comply with.
The protesters said they were “ready and willing” to work with the government, MPs and colleagues on further changes.
Taken together, these (amendments) would make the bill simpler, more effective and easier to enforce,” the letter reads.
“They would also place the responsibility on the tech giants to prevent harmful content from going viral or being promoted to vulnerable children, rather than controlling what we say. As the bill makes its way through parliament, this is the last chance to build in protections that work.”