Online bosses who fail to protect young face arrest
SOCIAL media bosses could be arrested if they break laws to protect young and vulnerable people online, the suicide prevention minister warned yesterday.
Jackie Doyle-Price said that selfharm and suicide images were being ‘normalised’ online and this had the effect of ‘grooming’ children.
Her warning came after digital minister Margot James told the Mail that web giants would be forced by law to sign up to a code of conduct to protect users.
Miss Doyle-Price told the BBC yesterday that new laws could be introduced if they failed to ‘step up’. Asked if bosses could then face arrest if they broke these laws, she said: ‘Nothing is off the table’.
She added: ‘We’ve seen in the past that these companies have been very cavalier about their responsibilities but equally, once their reputation is on the line they want to step up.’
She would encourage them to ‘do the right thing’ and if they did not fall in line ‘we will take legal powers to make sure they do – they have a duty of care to their users’.
She said that, in her view, social media sites were publishers, not platforms, so they should be held to account by the law.
Miss Doyle-Price brought up the tragedy of Molly Russell, 14, whose father blamed harmful images on Instagram for her death. ‘I have no doubt that the suicide and selfharm content of the kind that Molly viewed had the effect of normalising self-harm,’ she told the National Suicide Prevention Alliance conference.
‘It has an effect akin to grooming. We have embraced the liberal nature of social media platforms, but we need to protect ourselves and our children from the harm which can be caused.’
Miss Doyle-Price, who was last night meeting representatives of Instagram’s owners Facebook, said: ‘If companies cannot behave responsibly and protect their users, we will legislate. Providers ought to want to do this. They shouldn’t wait for government to tell them what to do.’
Her comments follow the stand taken by digital minister Miss James on new laws to protect vulnerable social media users.
She said the UK would create ‘world-leading laws’ to make this the safest place in the world to be online. ‘ Internet companies have always enjoyed legal protection from liability for user-generated content,’ she said.
‘This laissez-faire environment has led some companies to pursue growth and profitability with little regard for the security and interests of their users.
‘There is far too much bullying, abuse, misinformation and manipulation online as well as serious and organised crime.’
She said a White Paper on online harm would be published soon, followed by a consultation over the summer.
‘It will set out new legislative measures laws to ensure the platforms remove illegal content, and prioritise the protection of users, especially children, young people and vulnerable adults,’ she said.
Health secretary Matt Hancock is due to meet Instagram officials tomorrow to warn them about their approach.
Despite the controversy, the UK has been named the safest country in the world for internet users by Microsoft, but the tech giant warned that many still suffer from abuse, scams and unwanted attempts to make contact.