The UK government’s controversial Online Safety Bill has been delayed. The bill, seen as one of the Johnson government’s flagship endeavors, looks likely to be held and potentially significantly retooled following the prime minister’s resignation.
The bill is nominally in service of putting the responsibility for protecting users online on the backs of platforms and social networks. It created controversy early on by handing Ofcom power to directly fine companies that hosted ‘lawful but harmful’ content. While this approach was lauded by child safety activists, it was noted that in practice this would have privacy implications and was potentially unworkable.
Christie Dennehy-Neil is head of policy and regulatory affairs, IAB UK, said: “Following the news that the next Parliamentary stage of the Online Safety Bill has been delayed, we at IAB UK are continuing to urge the Government to remove fraudulent advertising from the scope of the Bill on the basis that it is already set to be comprehensively addressed as part of the Online Advertising Programme.
The Online Safety Bill has been controversial for its conflation of several different issues around privacy and online behavior / Tobias Tullius
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