Dr Aravinda Kosaraju from SSPSSR’s Centre for Child Protection comments on how the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport’s draft Online Safety Bill must not lose sight of protecting those most vulnerable:
‘There is no contention in saying that legal statutes can at times be instrumental to social change. Indeed, the introduction of the Online Safety Bill 2021 marks the beginning of the much-needed social change in how we would like our digital world governed.
‘The Bill purports to safeguard children and vulnerable adults from online harms, clamp down on racist abuse, tackle financial fraud and uphold democratic debate in our virtual spaces. Whilst the legislative intent is laudable, the Bill’s ambitious ‘one size fits all’ approach is problematic. The Bill’s potential to be viewed as an attempt to regulate free speech consequently pushes back the long strides made in its attempt to protect vulnerable children and adults.
‘Children like Molly Russel and Breck Bednar are not just a couple of high-profile child death cases, they signify our failure to protect the most vulnerable of our society. As a society, there is a significant lack of awareness of the physical and psychological effects of online abuse on children. Parents are often left to pick up the pieces whilst their children are self-harming, suicidal or continuing to be exploited online. Furthermore, law enforcement agencies are expected to deal with online abusers with meagre resources and limited co-operation from tech giants that control the means through which online harms are perpetuated.
‘The increased and necessary access of our children to the virtual environments during the pandemic and subsequent increase in the number of online child sexual abuse, grooming and exploitation activity signals the need for immediate regulation of online environments. The need to protect children and vulnerable adults online in the current climate is too important to deny and too urgent to delay. The time is now for ensuring ‘the duty of care’ of providers and users of online spaces are regulated to benefit the most vulnerable members of our society.
‘From a critical lawyer’s perspective legal instruments are not mere statements of intent, they are tools of power. These powers lie beyond the ability to regulate wrongful behaviour or promote rightful action. The ability to produce or contain a specific social discourse are far more powerful than law’s instrumental power. The proposed legislation has brought to public debate the question of how we want our virtual space to be regulated. It is time we meaningfully engage in this debate to harness the social responsibility of the providers, users, misusers, and abusers of online platforms in order to safeguard the interests and rights of our vulnerable netizens.’
Dr Aravinda Kosaraju is a socio-legal scholar and Lecturer at the Centre for Child Protection (CCP). CCP is a centre of excellence based at the University’s Medway campus. It has an international reputation for practice and research and its teaching draws on its innovative work in many areas of child protection.