Why the new Online Safety Bill could be a disaster for marketers

Like a deranged pinball machine, it continues its mad passage through parliament, collecting amendments and clauses that will cause untold damage in the real world.

Nevertheless, it could be on the statute books before next summer – even though WhatsApp, Signal and Wikipedia fear they may not be able to operate in the UK as a result.

Industry concerns were summed up by author Edwin Hayward who wrote in a blog it ‘will make the damage caused by Brexit look like a fart in a hurricane. The Online Safety Bill will ruin your experience of the internet. Guaranteed.’

He continued that it ‘has the potential to wreck the UK economy. It would cut the UK off from the normal internet the rest of the world experiences.’

Strong stuff indeed. So why such hyperbole? In many ways, few will take issues with the Bill’s aims. Originally conceived back in 2019 it aimed to protect children from the likes of porn and harassment as well as content that glorifies suicide, eating disorders, and self-harm.

However, through the years - as our pinball ricocheted through politics - it picked up a myriad of other clauses with the aim of protecting the entire community from the dangers of the online world.

Some have been struck down including a clause to protect adults from harmful, but legal content.

Arguments that this would become a censors charter won the day. However, it has been replaced with a rule that relevant websites will be legally required to enforce their own terms and conditions around harmful content.

Has the government simply outsourced its censorship to big tech is the question many now ask?

Other clauses deal with allowing site users to identify trolls, criminalizing cyber flashing and cracking down on fake ads, and monitoring content published in encrypted platforms like WhatsApp.

It is a huge complex, monster of a bill that aims to give websites a duty of care towards their users that in turn would be overseen by the UK regulator Ofcom.

Its intentions may be good – but there is a sense it is taking us to internet hell.

And the devil will be in the implementation. There are three main problem areas:

• How content will be monitored to make sure it is compliant – a huge challenge given the volume of content out there. YouTube alone sees 3.7m videos uploaded every day.

• Age verification: again how will users safely guarantee their age?

• How will encrypted messaging service be affected – perhaps one of the most controversial areas of all.

The bill has provisions to make end-to-end encrypted platforms like WhatsApp, Signal and Apple Messages scan all photos against a database to check for child sexual abuse material. This would make the UK the first major democracy to effectively ban end-to-end encrypted messaging.

WhatsApp head Will Cathcart wrote an open letter that was co-signed by the heads of six other messaging apps including Signal saying: "If implemented as written (this bill) could empower Ofcom to try to force the proactive scanning of a private message on end-to end-encrypted services – nullifying the purpose or end-to-end encryption as a result compromising the privacy of all users. In short, the bill poses an unprecedented threat to the privacy, safety and security of every UK citizen and the people with whom they communicate."

WhatsApp and Signal have made it clear, that as a result, they would have no option but to quit the UK if the bill came into force as drafted. They argue that it is simply not possible to create a backdoor only good actors will use. Once it is there, it is inevitable bad actors will also access it too with serious consequences around the world for those, for example, fighting for freedom in the likes of Ukraine or other trouble spots.

But the other astonishing element of the saga is the sheer cost. It is estimated that Ofcom will have to invest £150m as it hires an additional 400 staff to take on the task of regulating over 25,000 sites.

Meanwhile, the digital industry – it is estimated – will have to invest around £2bn to become compliant. This is possibly an understatement, to work, the regulator will have to reach into every corner of the world. Many platforms working out of other jurisdictions will be blissfully unaware that they will need to be Ofcom compliant if they want to serve UK citizens.

And of course, there is a chance other provisions will be added. The recent Lords amendment for example, would require sites to adapt their algorithms to avoid directing children towards controversial figures such as Andrew Tate.

The impact on digital services is likely to be profound. The challenge of telling the difference between adults and children may encourage certain services to simply treat everyone as children – (which you might think they have been doing for years in any case).

But others will no doubt follow the example of WhatsApp and Signal and decide that trading in the UK is not worth the risk. Wikipedia has suggested that this is their position – as their site would be forced to verify the age of visitors – which is counter to their core values of collecting as little data as possible on their users.

Let’s hope someone calls ‘tilt’ to stop this bizarre pinball game. If the bill is passed it will do a huge amount of harm to the digital industry, without even succeeding in its original aim of protecting kids. They will get around any safeguards faster than you can say VPN.