New rules unveiled to protect young children on social media | UK News

The Online Safety Bill was signed into legislation final week, forcing tech companies to make individuals safer on the web, notably children.
New rules have been unveiled to protect children on-line, which embrace limiting direct messages and eradicating them from instructed good friend lists.
They type a part of Ofcom’s first draft codes of apply beneath the Online Safety Act, which was signed into legislation per week in the past.
It focuses on unlawful materials on-line similar to grooming content material, fraud and youngster sexual abuse.
Platforms will probably be required by legislation to preserve children’s location knowledge personal – and limit who can ship direct messages to them.
Ofcom will publish extra rules within the subsequent few months round on-line security and the promotion of fabric associated to suicide and self-harm, with every new code requiring parliamentary approval earlier than it’s put in place.
It hopes the codes introduced in the present day will probably be enforced by the top of subsequent yr.
The code additionally encourages bigger platforms to use hash matching know-how to determine unlawful pictures of abuse – and instruments to detect web sites internet hosting such materials.
Ofcom mentioned companies ought to use computerized detection techniques to take away posts linked to stolen monetary data, and block accounts run by proscribed organisations.
Tech companies should additionally nominate an accountable particular person, Ofcom mentioned, who reviews to senior administration on compliance with the code.
August: Online youngster grooming at peak
Read extra:
What is the Online Safety Bill?
‘Sextortion’ instances soar
Ofcom chief government Dame Melanie Dawes advised Sky News: “I believe with out regulation it is not getting higher quick sufficient, and in some areas it’s going within the improper route.
“The extra that we see innovation in issues like AI, it means I’m afraid it is simpler for the dangerous guys to create fraudulent materials – that finally ends up dishonest us of our cash – and it makes it simpler to prey on children.”
Technology Secretary Michelle Donelan mentioned the publication of the primary codes marked a “essential” step in making the Online Safety Act a reality by “cleansing up the Wild West of social media and making the UK the most secure place on the planet to be on-line”.
She added: “Before the invoice grew to become legislation, we labored with Ofcom to be certain they might act swiftly to deal with probably the most dangerous unlawful content material first.
“By working with companies to set out how they can comply with these duties, the first of their kind anywhere in the world, the process of implementation starts today.”
The rapper, playing and the web world
Susie Hargreaves, chief government of the Internet Watch Foundation, mentioned: “We stand prepared to work with Ofcom, and with firms trying to do the precise factor to adjust to the brand new legal guidelines.
“It’s proper that defending children and guaranteeing the unfold of kid sexual abuse imagery is stopped is prime of the agenda.
“It’s important firms are proactive in assessing and understanding the potential dangers on their platforms, and taking steps to be certain security is designed in.
“Making the web safer doesn’t finish with this invoice changing into an act. The scale of kid sexual abuse, and the harms children are uncovered to on-line, have escalated within the years this laws has been going via parliament.
“Companies in scope of the regulations now have a huge opportunity to be part of a real step forward in terms of child safety.”