UK Parliament Passes Online Safety Bill (techcrunch.com) 75
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Controversial UK legislation that brings in a new regime of content moderation rules for online platforms and services -- establishing the comms watchdog Ofcom as the main Internet regulator -- has been passed by parliament today, paving the way for Royal Assent and the Online Safety Bill becoming law in the coming days. Speaking during the bill's final stages in the House of Lords, Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay reiterated that the government's intention for the legislation is "to make the UK the safest place in the world to be online, particularly for children." Following affirmative votes as peers considered some last stage amendments he added that attention now moves "very swiftly to Ofcom who stand ready to implement this -- and do so swiftly."
The legislation empowers Ofcom to levy fines of up to 10% (or up to 18 million pounds whichever is higher) of annual turnover for violations of the regime. The Online Safety (nee Harms) Bill has been years in the making as UK policymakers have grappled with how to response to a range of online safety concerns. In 2019 these efforts manifested as a white paper with a focus on rules for tackling illegal content (such as terrorism and CSAM) but also an ambition to address a broad sweep of online activity that might be considered harmful, such as violent content and the incitement of violence; encouraging suicide; disinformation; cyber bullying; and adult material being accessed by children. The effort then morphed into a bill that was finally published in May 2021. [...]
In a brief statement the UK's new web content sheriff gave no hint of the complex challenges that lie ahead -- merely welcoming the bill's passage through parliament and stating that it stands ready to implement the new rulebook. "Today is a major milestone in the mission to create a safer life online for children and adults in the UK. Everyone at Ofcom feels privileged to be entrusted with this important role, and we're ready to start implementing these new laws," said Dame Melanie Dawes, Ofcom's CEO. "Very soon after the Bill receives Royal Assent, we'll consult on the first set of standards that we'll expect tech firms to meet in tackling illegal online harms, including child sexual exploitation, fraud and terrorism." Beyond specific issues of concern, there is over-arching general worry over the scale of the regulatory burden the legislation will apply to the UK's digital economy -- since the rules apply not only to major social media platforms; scores of far smaller and less well resourced online services must also comply or risk big penalties.
The legislation empowers Ofcom to levy fines of up to 10% (or up to 18 million pounds whichever is higher) of annual turnover for violations of the regime. The Online Safety (nee Harms) Bill has been years in the making as UK policymakers have grappled with how to response to a range of online safety concerns. In 2019 these efforts manifested as a white paper with a focus on rules for tackling illegal content (such as terrorism and CSAM) but also an ambition to address a broad sweep of online activity that might be considered harmful, such as violent content and the incitement of violence; encouraging suicide; disinformation; cyber bullying; and adult material being accessed by children. The effort then morphed into a bill that was finally published in May 2021. [...]
In a brief statement the UK's new web content sheriff gave no hint of the complex challenges that lie ahead -- merely welcoming the bill's passage through parliament and stating that it stands ready to implement the new rulebook. "Today is a major milestone in the mission to create a safer life online for children and adults in the UK. Everyone at Ofcom feels privileged to be entrusted with this important role, and we're ready to start implementing these new laws," said Dame Melanie Dawes, Ofcom's CEO. "Very soon after the Bill receives Royal Assent, we'll consult on the first set of standards that we'll expect tech firms to meet in tackling illegal online harms, including child sexual exploitation, fraud and terrorism." Beyond specific issues of concern, there is over-arching general worry over the scale of the regulatory burden the legislation will apply to the UK's digital economy -- since the rules apply not only to major social media platforms; scores of far smaller and less well resourced online services must also comply or risk big penalties.
helmet (Score:2)
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I strongly recommend the goggles.
Say what you will about the U.S., but ... (Score:3)
Re:Say what you will about the U.S., but ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Considering that one of the main goals of passing this sort of legislation is a political lock-in of the current regime and ideology, chances of opposition to this bill getting elected any time soon is a tall order.
Both main parties in UK support it, because it helps to block material from their main competitors as "disinformation".
Re:Say what you will about the U.S., but ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Ah, "disinformation," the new buzzword to get around free speech and shut up your political enemies, since it's entirely subjective yet it has that objective-y sound!
Any time you hear it, run the other fucking way;he person using is a fool, or an authoritarian cunt.
Re:Say what you will about the U.S., but ... (Score:5, Informative)
Ah, "disinformation," the new buzzword to get around free speech and shut up your political enemies, since it's entirely subjective yet it has that objective-y sound!
There is no freedom of speech in the U.K., and there has not been any for a very long time, every looong before Brexit.
And before y'all butthurt chavs start downvoting, have a look at this very comprehensive list of people arrested for what everywhere else in the world would constitute free speech:
In October 2011, 28-year old Stephen Birrell was sentenced to eight months in jail for engaging in Scottish sectarianism. He made posts to a Facebook page called "Neil Lennon should be banned" which insulted Catholics and the Pope. Sheriff Bill Totten stated "the right-thinking people of Glasgow and Scotland will not allow any behaviour of this nature".
In May 2012, 21-year old Liam Stacey spent 56 days in jail for tweeting "LOL, Fuck Muamba. He's dead."
During the 2012 Olympics, diver Tom Daley retweeted a message that said "You let your dad down i hope you know that", insulting him for finishing fourth. Its 17-year old author was arrested on suspicion of "malicious communication"
In October 2012, 19-year old Matthew Woods was jailed for 12 weeks because of jokes he made about two abducted children April Jones and Madeleine McCann. The messages, including "Who in their right mind would abduct a ginger kid?" were copied from Sickipedia and posted to Facebook
In December 2014, 19-year old Ross Loraine was arrested and cited for making light of the 2014 Glasgow bin lorry crash on Twitter. The tweet, which he deleted shortly after posting, stated that after the driver's vehicle struck pedestrians, this was "the most trash it has picked up in one day"
In March 2015, 24-year old Scott Lamont was sentenced to spend four months in jail for singing Billy Boys at a Rangers FC game.
In January 2019, community cohesion officer Mansoor Gul questioned Lincolnshire ex-police officer Harry Miller over the fact that he had retweeted a poem that condemned gender transitions. While confirming that no crime had been committed, Gul stated that it qualified as a "hate incident" and told Miller that his employer might be displeased.
In July 2022, British army veteran Darren Brady, was arrested "on suspicion of sending by public communication network an offensive, indecent, obscene, menacing message" for allegedly retweeting an image of the "Progress Pride Flag" arranged into a swastika.
Source for all of these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
And even the press is not safe: British Press forbidden to write about public figures: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Sincerely, Fuck The UK.
Re:Say what you will about the U.K., but ... (Score:1)
The US has entire zones where there is no free speech and unlike the UK, does not protect other forms of expression.
US citizen jailed for criticising the police [theguardian.com] - at least you can do that here in the UK, one of the roles of the Chief Constable is to address complaints about the police from the public. At least we don't let our cops act like a law unto themselves.
If you're arrested here, the police need evidence and that needs t
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No country in the world allow
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I don't think anything you've mentioned is remotely equivalent.
Canada is much worse than England. They've been censoring and jailing people for two decades now for violation of leftist speech codes. A few years ago they passed forced pronoun usage into law.
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Ah, "disinformation," the new buzzword to get around free speech and shut up your political enemies, since it's entirely subjective yet it has that objective-y sound!
Any time you hear it, run the other fucking way;he person using is a fool, or an authoritarian cunt.
You mean this 'new' buzzword?
https://www.amazon.com/Disinfo... [amazon.com]
Although the book is only 10 years old or so, the word "disinformation" ("dezinformatsiya") can be traced back to 1950 at least.
So does that make Lt. Gen. Pacepa, the defected ex-director of Ceausescu's Securitate, a fool or an authoritarian cunt?
Re:Say what you will about the U.S., but ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Britain has many problems, but that is not one of them.
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Re:Say what you will about the U.S., but ... (Score:5, Insightful)
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If it were fit for purpose, it wouldn't be allowed. Just like voting.
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Nice sentiment, but actually:
1. Parliament is still legally and theoretically sovereign (jointly with the monarch), but in practice it has become a helpless rubber stamp (jointly with the monarch). Policy and actions are decided by the executive - meaning the Prime Minister and his rapidly growing crew of civil servants and "experts". None of them are accountable to anyone except the corporations for whom they work. (Actually, modern political parties are corporations - small ones that are wholly owned by b
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OTOH, the parties are not completely whipped, how many PM's have been tossed by Parliament in the last decade? Here in Canada, the main parties are completely whipped, the very odd time a MP votes against the party is rare enough to make national news and the only way the PM is removed is in a general election.
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Most of the UK's democracy problems would be solved with proportional voting instead of the awful first past the post they have.
Anything is better than whatever nonsense is currently going on the America though. Their Supreme Court literally ruled that corruption is fine and everyone just shrugged like it was nothing.
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It doesn't work very well in practice. Arguably a lot of that is due to things like having a two party system, but the basic design with the Lords is a huge flaw.
For those who don't know, the House of Lords is a second chamber that is supposed to examine what Parliament is doing and act as a balance for parliamentary power. The problem is that Parliament can ignore it. And the people in the Lords are all either hereditary peers (passed down from a parent), a religious leader (!), or a crony put there by the
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The problem is that Parliament can ignore it. And the people in the Lords are all either hereditary peers (passed down from a parent), a religious leader (!), or a crony put there by the government of the day.
I'd say at this point that the stuffing with cronies is substantially worse than the hereditary peers and religious leaders. Turns out if you bribe enough money to the Tories, even a Russian spy can become a crony peer.
Which brings us onto Starmer, who's sole idea is to remove the latter and stuff the
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Indeed, fuck Starmer. I don't know who I can vote for at the next election. It doesn't really matter in my constituency anyway, but between Starmer and their weak position on things like LGBT rights it is getting quite difficult to vote for them.
Unless a miracle looks like happening I'll probably vote Green, if they stand here.
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Personally, I'd vote labour if I was in a marginal constituency.
Under Starmer they are way too conservative for my taste, but they are still less crazy-right than the Tories, less corrupt, and haven't purged everyone with a shred of decency and competence. It is clear to me that they are vastly better than the Tories. They are like a watered down Tory party, but that's a lot better than undiluted Tories.
They're likely to win and it does not fill me with hope for the future. We'll see more austerity and the
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I don't really care about nuclear weapons. I don't trust any potential PM to use them responsibly anyway.
I'd much rather have someone with a real conscience and desire to make this a better country. Most of them don't seem to be keen on nuclear weapons.
I think at this point though you are right, Labour is the least bad option. It's just a really shame that the UK is going to lose at least another decade now.
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At least SCOTUS can reverse bullshit laws like this
SCOTUS works entirely within a legal framework. They don't get to reverse laws because they don't like them. The thing is SCOTUS would strike this down based on some amendments of the US constitution. The key word there isn't "constitution", it's "amendment", i.e. a change that a previous government made to the constitution.
SCOTUS isn't what is keeping this kind of bullshit away, the inability for 2/3rds of the House and Senate to agree on such a shitty law is what is keeping such bullshit away.
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SCOTUS works entirely within a legal framework. They don't get to reverse laws because they don't like them.
Wanna bet? Remember Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, the SCOTUS decision that eliminated fifty years of jurisprudence that said that abortion was a civil right? Do you not think that Justice Alito didn't first make up his mind and then find a legal justification for it that his conservative cronies would then follow? The current court is filled with judicial hypocrites and all of them
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>>"SCOTUS works entirely within a legal framework. They don't get to reverse laws because they don't like them."
>"Wanna bet? Remember Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, the SCOTUS decision that eliminated fifty years of jurisprudence that said that abortion was a civil right?"
Sorry, but you have it exactly backwards. The malfunction of the court was CREATING a "civil right" out of Dobbs that didn't exist, never existed, isn't in the Constitution, and isn't within Federal powers. And up
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>"No, the power is not closer to the people. It is in the hands of six unelected"
You missed it completely. The power of the decision is *NOW* closer to the people than it was before.
>"mostly ultra right-wing clowns who are, like you and like"
It is not "ultra right-wing" to believe in the Constitution and that the courts should not create legislation.
>"the majority of the Republicans in the US, a crazed neo-fascist ideologue."
You are completely unhinged and obviously have no idea who I am or what I
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Even RBG promoted the fact that Row/Dobbs was bad law when it was passed. Go back and look at her statements and writings.
No, it is not really a "living" document. There is a mechanism for updating it....ammendments.
Other than that, the SCOTUS is to rule based on the original i
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Reply to self:
>"CREATING a "civil right" out of Dobbs that didn't exist"
That was obviously meant to be "out of Roe"
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Of course, you have conveniently overlooked the utterly corrupt practices, including lying to Congress, the last three justices used to get on the court. What are we at now...two credible rapists, a bunch of them taking money from corporations and individuals who have cases in front of them, and at least three bona fide religious fanatics.
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Um right. "Credible."
So, what is a woman? Oh, that answer wasn't politics, was it...
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Are you really that stupid? Read and learn, child:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/sex-redefined-the-idea-of-2-sexes-is-overly-simplistic1/ [scientificamerican.com]
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The Judiciary (Judges in law courts) can create case law that reflects the application of law. Meaning that a Judicial review can declare a law unlawful.
Basically, a test case needs to be presented to the Judiciary and the Judges can see how a law has been applied. The Judges can make recommendations to government to constrain a law including declaring a law unlawful because the law is incompatible with other laws such as human rights laws.
Laws can be amended in Parliament when side-effects occur such as un
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Thing#1 wrong with SCOTUS, it has judges appointed by TRUMP!
Items #2-5 can wait 'cos #1 is a big frackin' problem (which happened with the failed US constitution).
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Intention (Score:4, Insightful)
>"Parkinson of Whitley Bay reiterated that the government's intention for the legislation is"
And there you have it.
It really doesn't matter what the "intention" is, what matters is what happens after. And it isn't going to be good. Britain 1984.
Won't work (Score:1)
The only way to be completely safe (Score:3)
Is to never do anything, never explore, never invent, never create, just stay in your padded cell with your helmet on
Kinda like the old saying, a ship is safe in port, but that's not why we build ships
Stay busy with enforcement (Score:1)
Glad we resolved that one! (Score:2)
So, given that this seems to be headed to success, I presume they managed to come up with an unambiguous definition for "disinformation" - one that protects free speech but prevents objectively harmful content. Great, let's see it!
Re:Glad we resolved that one! (Score:4, Interesting)
"I presume they managed to come up with an unambiguous definition for 'disinformation'..."
Of course they did. It goes something like this: If we say it's disinformation, it's disinformation. If we say it isn't, it isn't. Not much ambiguity there!
And in other news... (Score:5, Insightful)
Every pervert in the UK now has a VPN based in a country that doesn't give a toss about UK Parliament. Meanwhile, perverts working within the UK government and police are opening champagne to celebrate this latest step in the continuing degeneration of the UK into a police state where individual privacy is just a sad memory.
"We're only doing (enter your oppressive measure here) to keep your children safe" has long been the plaint of the would-be tyrant.
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VPNs aren't much use with social media and even email. You need a working phone number to sign up.
You can buy disposable SIMs on eBay for next to nothing. I wouldn't rely on the seller not retaining a record of who bought which number though. They are okay for creating spare accounts or when you don't want to give an org your real long term phone number, but not if you are intending to break the law.
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You can't just walk into a store over there and buy a SIM with cash anonymously?
You can do it here in the US.
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They require activating. The eBay sellers activate them in bulk before selling them. The activation process involves some kind of ID, usually putting a payment method on file.
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> You can't just walk into a store over there and buy a SIM with cash anonymously?
If you are lucky enough to find a cash machine and the shop takes cash still.
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VPN's wont save you. All that happens is you trust a company not to watch what you do and take action vs your ISP.
They know who you are, where you are and what you are doing.
UK will soon be losing all secure messaging (Score:5, Insightful)
The need to provide access to all encrypted communication and the messaging services like Signal, Apple Messages, ProtonMail, and WhatsApp refuse to alter their service to allow this kind of access, means that if the Online Safety Bill is enforced they will disable their services in the UK.
Whenever the government decides that it is "technically feasible" to "safely" monitor end to end encrypted communications, all these apps will need to decide if they will stick to the privacy road and leave the UK, or open up their services.
How Angry Will They Be? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Canâ(TM)t Apple restart the CSAM service and be compliant?
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The need to provide access to all encrypted communication and the messaging services like Signal, Apple Messages, ProtonMail, and WhatsApp refuse to alter their service to allow this kind of access, means that if the Online Safety Bill is enforced they will disable their services in the UK.
Whenever the government decides that it is "technically feasible" to "safely" monitor end to end encrypted communications, all these apps will need to decide if they will stick to the privacy road and leave the UK, or open up their services.
Actually, the companies will pretty much tell the government to go do one. Quickly this bill will be forgotten.
The government tried so hard with it's anti-piracy bill... Blocked a few well known torrent sites but couldn't actually stop the torrents. Now an average web browser has a VPN that bypasses it to let you go to RARBG or whatever remains blocked. It's obvious the list isn't maintained as new sites aren't even blocked (especially as the newer ones tend to be more focused on... erm... gentlemen's sp
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> The need to provide access to all encrypted communication and the messaging services like Signal, Apple Messages, ProtonMail, and WhatsApp refuse to alter their service to allow this kind of access, means that if the Online Safety Bill is enforced they will disable their services in the UK.
Nope that was removed earlier
Teach "stranger danger" (Score:5, Interesting)
Self-hosted services such as Mastodon will have to exclude the UK: The easy way to obey the law also becomes corporatism as only mega-corporations can provide the required censoring. As I recall, Apple and a few software giants refused to do that, instead promising to block the UK if this law passed.
Under US guidance, large quantities of nudity have disappeared and countries have implemented over-reaching censorship (eg. African/Melanesian festivals, art, historical events) in the guise of eliminating kiddie-porn. Despite this, the 'no female nipples' rule is still broken on a per-minute basis.
This law allows the government to censor anything with "won't someone please think of the children?" As I recall, a large number of objections to this bill concentrated on the search and spying powers given to police.
Children live in a world created by adults: Most of the world is "adult material". Since the 1980s, children's stories have banned death and tweenie's stories (where support characters are several years older, being young adults) have banned nudity and adult relationships. This is all done in the name of 'they're not ready', with the world censored to placate the lowest common denominator: Often, that is the parents, not the children.
Even the truth, sex education for children, is picketed or banned. Lying to children about what adults do, does not help them. It also creates a paradox: How can we teach "stranger danger" if there is nothing bad in the world. It's a lesson that's more important as strangers are only a Facebook page away.
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> Self-hosted services such as Mastodon will have to exclude the UK
We will just run our own Mastodon instances. Like you say they are self hosted?
Most of the time I only want to interact with those who speak english so I never look at the wider masto network. I typically only look for those in my area actually!
> sex education for children
Oh dont worry about that. The lefty schools here in the UK have that all in hand as we have been seeing in the news!
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The lefty schools here ...
The government has been "reviewing" sex-education curriculum for 3 years: It doesn't sound like progress to anything, and of course, the complaints about "traumatized" children are not credible.
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> I see no other option that to simply block all of Britain
Please do.
Thankyou for protecting us from your illegal activities. In fact, you havnt done that already? Are you able to handle GDPR then?
Whose first? (Score:2)
So what will be the first big tech company to exit the UK because of this law's moderation guidelines?
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Wikipedia will not perform Online Safety Bill age checks [bbc.co.uk]
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It is hard to overestimate what an incredibly bad idea requiring a website to conduct age verification to display the sort of material that could be found in a public library would be. Mandatory age verification for services that provide or specialize in material that is overtly pornographic is probably the intent though, to the degree that those services are within the reach of UK law.
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So what will be the first big tech company to exit the UK because of this law's moderation guidelines?
None.
They'll just ignore the law.
If HMRC isn't going to go after tech giants for flagrant violations of taxation laws, OFCOM isn't going to do shit. They can't even keep control of the TV channels that only exist in the UK.
Internet Exit: inexit! (Score:2)
Soon Little Britain will just be an isolated island out of mind and out of sight.
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Mixed (Score:1)
I've been wanting and not wanting this for ages.
UK's turism (Score:2)
If it keeps going like this, UK's main touristic attraction will be to watch a real life 1984 like country.
100 bucks and you get to operate a telescreen for an hour.