Online Safety Act, Censorship and Free Speech in a Crisis
Not my usual type of post, but I feel very strongly about this, not least because this issue has a big impact on neurodivergent people.
This morning, I read in the mainstream media that the government is pledging to crack down on social media content that promotes hatred, provokes violence and encourages offences under UK law in response to the riots in Belfast this week. In itself, this sounds like the right thing to do. The problem I have is the context and the language, as I feel the results of the proposals go far beyond what is reasonable in a democratic society. [4] [1]
Firstly, my thoughts go out to all those in Northern Ireland who have been impacted by this unacceptable violence. To be clear, I do not condone what has happened in Belfast, not in the slightest. This post isn’t about that, nor is it about party politics, it is about freedom of speech and democracy. Violence and intimidation are wrong and should be met with the full force of the law.
Online Safety Act, Belfast and crisis moderation
This proposal is deeply worrying, people should be worried about this. My concerns arise from the fact that this appears to be at best a response to perceived political pressure in response to a crisis and at worst a knee-jerk reaction to the crisis. If they were saying that they will crack down on incitement, that is something I would definitely support. Threats, harassment, violence and criminal encouragement are already covered by law, and there are already mechanisms to detect and prosecute offenders. This would be a measured response that will reassure the public, and use existing powers to do so.
The government is suggesting that it wants to go further and compel social media companies to remove content that may promote hatred or provoke violence quickly in the event of a “crisis”, and they will do so, through Ofcom, using powers that they already have under the Online Safety Act. Again, on paper, this sounds perfectly reasonable. However, the problem is the use of the Online Safety Act. [1] [2] [3]
Under the Online Safety Act, the government has created a system where Ofcom can impose massive fines on organisations that do not comply. Organisations do not want to be in a position where they are paying potentially crippling fines for infringements, so this creates a situation where they play it safe. They will seek to remove anything that they believe could be construed as incitement in a time of “crisis” [3]
Why the word crisis matters
The key issue here is the use of the word “crisis”. This is a very vague term. Who decides what a crisis actually is? What is the threshold? [2]
Citizen journalism, images and the public record
Furthermore, there is a specific mention of images, which in these times, people share freely and easily on social media. In fact, this citizen journalism has become one of the fundamental tools of free speech in oppressed societies around the world, and where a situation is developing rapidly. If posts, images and videos are removed during unrest, what happens to the public record? A removed video might be misinformation. It might also be evidence of an assault, police conduct, community intimidation, arson, or the order of events. [5] [6]
Talking about a demonstration outside Downing Street? asking why “police are blocking the road outside Kings Cross station”, “someone says there has been an attack, can anyone confirm”?
The natural outcome of this is that somebody simply reporting what they saw could result in it being removed, without their knowledge, despite not doing anything illegal or breaching acceptable use policies. This is quite simply censorship, which in a democratic society is totally unacceptable. Unless the term “crisis” is defined legally, risk-averse social media will play it safe and remove such content, irrespective of whether it is illegal or not and deal with the fallout later. People must be free to document public disorder, police action, community harm and official responses. If lawful content is removed during a crisis, people should know why and have a route to challenge it.
The platform problem
Even worse, the danger here is not only Ofcom requirements. It is what platforms will actually do when they are told to act quickly, at scale, during a crisis, with massive fines hanging over them. They will not have lawyers or even staff checking every post. They will use automated systems, keyword triggers, image scanning, user reports and rushed moderation decisions. The written rule may sound narrow, but the platform response will be blunt. That is how lawful posts, videos and eyewitness accounts get removed before anyone has properly checked what they are. This is already happening, and we are seeing news coverage of the war in Ukraine and Gaza being removed for non-age-verified users. [5] [6]
The concern is not whether illegal content should be removed. The concern is who decides what information is removed in a crisis. A democratic society should be very cautious about restricting lawful public speech. Putting the decisions around this in the hands of a social media company, based in another country, under threat of severe financial penalties, is not caution, it is actually encouraging censorship. So it’s not the government censoring things, they leave that up to the platforms and remove any accountability for it.
In a crisis, the public often learns through fragments of information. Some fragments are false. Some are true before officials confirm them. Treating all unofficial reporting as suspicious gives too much power to official timelines
This sits in a wider context where the prime minister has become increasingly focused on making social media companies censor content faster. Social media companies are policing free speech quickly under the threat of major penalties.
The really scary thing for me is that the government does not need to censor posts directly. It has created a regulatory route through Ofcom, and Ofcom puts the pressure onto the platforms. By the time a lawful post disappears, accountability has been scattered between the government, the regulator and the platform. Everyone can point somewhere else. This route may be technically available, but the public did not sign up to having lawful citizen reporting filtered during a crisis by nervous platforms under regulatory pressure.
I am not asking for abuse, racism or incitement to be protected. I am asking why lawful speech and citizen reporting are being treated as problems to manage.
Why this matters for neurodivergent people
Neurodivergent people often rely on online spaces for accessing information on current affairs because public debate, live news, official statements and face-to-face civic life can be less accessible. So this is especially relevant to our community. If you share my concerns, I implore you to share this, and to write to your MP expressing your concerns.