UK Decides To Regulate Social Networks

Phone screen showing various social media apps, WhatsApp included

The regulation of social media has been a topical and polarizing issue over the past few months. Some think it’s absolutely necessary whilst others are against such a move.

This polarization hasn’t stopped the UK’s government from deciding that some form of regulation is necessary to hold accountable for the spread of “online harms,” like misinformation, terrorist propaganda, and content depicting child sexual abuse .

There was a joint announced from the UKs Home Office and the Department of Culture, Media & Sport stating that social networks will be fined or blocked if they fail to comply with the regulations that are being put in place.

The provisional document (Online Harms Whitepaper) published a few days ago details the offensive content and also goes a step ahead by suggesting how the social networks can tackle these issues.

According to the BBC, there would also be the formation of a watchdog agency that monitors whether or not the social networks are actually compliant.

With the way fake news has been impacting the world, it’s no surprise that this will be one of the main reasons why governments are so eager to start regulating social media networks. Even our own government has complained about the impact of fake news on the economy. Whatever measures implemented locally will probably end up being stricter than they need to be which was one of the big fears of users but the truth is social networks have been given years to be self-governing and that hasn’t really worked out.