‘Protect children – or face the law’

SOCIAL media sites may face criminal sanctions if they fail to rein in their behaviour, the Culture Secretary said yesterday.

Sites could be forced to follow a compulsory code of ethics to protect young and vulnerable users, the culture committee said in a separate report on Fake News And Disinformation, published today. It calls for an independent regulator to ensure companies define and remove harmful content. It said the new code should establish a legal duty of care to make social media sites liable for harmful and illegal content on their platforms.

Yesterday, Culture Secretary Jeremy Wright said he would look at ‘all possible options for penalties’ for companies who break the law, telling the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show that these options will include criminal sanctions.