Safety technology

Social media is a significant aspect of daily life for most of us. Almost all adult internet users use some form of online communication platform.

How Ofcom plans to issue information notices to relevant providers for the purpose of categorisation.

Two months out from online safety laws coming into force, Ofcom has warned tech firms they could face enforcement action if they don’t comply with new duties when the time comes.

The Online Safety Act (OSA) makes businesses, and anyone else who operates a wide range of online services, legally responsible for keeping people (especially children) in the UK safe online.

We wanted to find out if behavioural techniques could be used to increase the number of users accessing online terms and conditions (T&Cs). And does accessing T&Cs actually make a difference to how people behave online?

This is a discussion paper by Ofcom’s Behavioural Insight Hub that presents research aimed at understanding the user relationships with social media T&Cs, specifically Community Guidelines.

This online trial tested different ways to encourage children to access age-appropriate user support materials (or help centre) during the sign-up process of a mock social media platform.

We speak to Owen Bennett, Ofcom’s Head of International Online Safety, about how online safety policy affects us all in the UK and why international collaboration is so crucial.

Ofcom is exploring how online services could employ safety measures to protect their users from harm posed by GenAI.

This discussion paper covers two online experiments run by Ofcom’s Behavioural Insight Hub that tested how platform choice architecture affects use of content controls among adult users.