Online Safety Act

The Online Safety Act 2023 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom intended to improve internet safety, published as a draft on 12 May 2021. Following the earlier 2019 Online Harms White Paper, the Act gives the relevant Secretary of State the power, subject to Parliamentary approval, to designate and address a wide range of potentially harmful content, which may include online trolling, illegal pornography and underage access to legal pornography, and some forms of internet fraud.

Quotes

• only services which pose the highest risk to children will use age verification technologies
  • Heritage Minister Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay on his view of the scope of services needing age verification under the proposed legislation.

• violate our commitment to collect minimal data about readers and contributors
  • Rebecca MacKinnon, as reported by the BBC on 28 April 2023, of the Wikimedia Foundation on bill requirements on how Wikimedia collects information and effect bill compliance would likely have.

• definitely possible that one of the most visited websites in the world - and a vital source of freely accessible knowledge and information for millions of people - won't be accessible to UK readers (let alone UK-based contributors)
  • Lucy Crompton-Reid, chief executive of Wikimedia UK, as reported by the BBC on 28 April 2023.