It’s time to discipline the lawless internet

HOW much longer can the arrogant, filth- spreading, fake newsmongering, tax- dodging, small firm- destroying, terror-abetting internet giants remain above the law?

In the latest egregious example, commendably exposed by the BBC, the Corporation reported dozens of sexualised images of children to Facebook, on whose platform they appeared.

These included photographs of under-16s in lewd poses, with obscene comments posted beside them – and stolen images of children on pages explicitly aimed at paedophiles.

One picture appeared to be a still from a video of child abuse, with a request below it to share ‘child pornography’.

Yet of 100 such images the BBC reported to Facebook, the site removed only 18, declaring in its automated replies that the other 82 – including the freeze-frame from the abuse video – did not breach ‘community standards’.

Meanwhile, in an almost surreal twist, the social network reported the BBC to the police when, as requested, it provided Facebook with examples of offensive material that had not been removed.

Shouldn’t Facebook itself be in the dock for giving a platform to such images in the first place?

But then like other social networks – and search engines such as Google, which point users to countless obscene websites – it seems never to be held to account.

Indeed, so casually does the American giant take its moral responsibilities that it won’t even reveal how many moderators it employs to police millions of pages of content in the UK.

Yet any newspaper that published the kind of filth freely available on the internet would instantly be hauled before the courts or the independent regulator, IPSO, which has the power to impose huge fines.

Nor is it only in spreading pornography that the online giants seem a law unto themselves. Every day, with absolute impunity, they offer platforms for invented news stories, blatant libels and even terrorist videos, while sites such as Wikipedia pump out lies.

Meanwhile, too often, social networks have refused to cooperate with the authorities in identifying sexual predators or potential terrorists, pleading they must respect the privacy of the individual.

Yet at the same time, they ruthlessly invade privacy for their own advantage, on a scale never seen before, gathering information on users and targeting advertising at those whose profiles suggest they are most likely to succumb.

And all the while, they suck revenue from the responsible, law- abiding media – driving many local newspapers to the wall, thereby leaving court cases and council decisions increasingly unreported.

In other fields of commerce, too, online giants reap huge and unfair competitive advantages from a legal and fiscal system that lags far behind the internet age.

Take companies such as Google, which side-steps the taxman by shifting earnings all over the world. Meanwhile, firms such as Amazon and eBay are accused of turning a blind eye to foreign sellers dodging £7billion in customs duty and VAT – while killing off High Street shops hit by sky-high business rates which they escape.

It is high time for a major international effort to wake up to the perils of the electronic age and bring the internet giants within the scope of regulators and the law.

What we need is a concerted campaign to emulate the American ‘trustbusters’ of the 1930s, who confronted the worst excesses of runaway capitalism by breaking up unscrupulous monopolies and making them answerable to the courts.

Every day’s delay is another field-day for pornographers, paedophiles and liars – and tax-dodging giants that profit from them.