My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Baronesses, Lady Parminter and Lady Deech, and the noble Lord, Lord Mann, for their support. After a miscellaneous selection of amendments, we now come back to a group of quite tight amendments. Given the hour, those scheduling the groupings should be very pleased because for the first time we have done all the groups that we set out to do this afternoon. I do not want to tempt fate, but I think we will have a good debate before we head off for a little break from the Bill for a while.
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I am very sympathetic to the other amendments in this grouping: Amendments 192A and 194. I think there is a common theme running through them all, unsurprisingly, which I hope my noble friend the Minister will be able to address in his remarks. Some of these amendments come about because we do not know the exact categorisation of the services we are most concerned about in this House and beyond, and how that categorisation process is going to work and be kept under review. That is probably the reason behind this group of amendments.
As noble Lords will be aware, the Bill proposes two major categories of regulated company, category 1 and category 2, and there is another carve-out for search services. Much of the discussion about the Bill has focused on the regulatory requirements for category 1 companies, but—again, we have not seen the list—it is expected that the list of category 1 companies may number only a few dozen, while thousands and thousands of platforms and search engines may not meet that threshold. But some of those other platforms, while attracting small user numbers, are hubs for extremely hateful content. In a previous debate we heard about the vile racist abuse often aimed at particular groups. Some of these platforms are almost outside some of our own experiences. They are deliberately designed to host such hateful content and to try to remain under the radar, but they are undoubtedly deeply influential, particularly to those—often vulnerable—users who access them.
Platforms such as 8kun, 4chan and BitChute are perhaps becoming more well known, whereas Odysee, Rumble and Minds remain somewhat obscure. There are numerous others, and all are easily accessible from anyone’s browser. What does the harm caused by these platforms look like? Some examples are in the public domain. For example, the mass shooting in Buffalo, in America, was carried out by a terrorist whose manifesto was inspired by 4chan’s board and who spoke of its influence on him. Later in this debate we are going to hear about specific content related to suicide, self-harm or eating disorders, which we have already debated in other contexts in these Committee proceedings.
The Center for Countering Digital Hate revealed that the four leading forums it analysed for incels—involuntary celibates—were filled with extreme hatred of women, glorification of violence and active discussion of paedophilia. On Gab, an “anti-Jewish meme repository”, grotesque anti-Semitic caricatures of Jews are shared from an account with an offensive name
that seeks to deny the Holocaust. Holocaust denial material is similarly shared across BitChute, where it is also possible to find a video on the supposed
“Jewish Plan To Genocide The White Race”
and, of course, 9/11 conspiracy theories. Meanwhile, on Odysee, other than discussion of the supposed “fake Holocaust” one can find discussion of the “Jewish problem”. On Minds, both President Zelensky and President Putin are condemned for having “kike”—an offensive term for Jews—inner circles, while other posts state that communism is Jewish control and the vessel to destroy our freedom.
The Government and many others know very well that these small, high-harm platforms are a problem. MPs in earlier debates on this Bill raised concerns repeatedly. The noble Lord, Lord Austin, raised this at Second Reading in your Lordships’ House and, nearly a year ago, the then Secretary of State issued a ministerial Statement indicating that, while the Government appreciated that small high-harm platforms do damage,
“more research is required before such platforms can be assigned to the category 1 designation for the online safety regime”.
This was despite Ofcom’s road map for online safety making it clear that it had already identified a number of small platforms that are clearly giving cause for concern.
So the case for action, as set out in my remarks and elsewhere, is proven. The Antisemitism Policy Trust has given evidence to the Joint Committee on the draft Bill and the Bill Committee in another place about this. The Community Security Trust, HOPE not hate and many others have data that demonstrates the level of hateful anti-Semitic and other racist and misogynistic abuse on these platforms. I know others will refer to the work of the Samaritans, the Mental Health Foundation and Beat in raising issues around suicide, self-harm and eating disorder content.
Extraordinarily, these are not platforms where this content is stumbled on or somehow hidden. They are set up deliberately to spread this content, to get people to look at it and to amplify this deeply harmful material. These sites act as feeders for hateful messages and activity on mainstream platforms or as receptors for those directed away from those larger services to niche, hate-filled rabbit holes. We need to think about this as the Bill is implemented. As we hope that the larger platforms will take action and live up to the terms of service they say they have, without action this content will unfortunately disappear to smaller platforms which will still be accessed and have action in the online and offline worlds. I hope my noble friend the Minister will say something about post-implementation in relation to these platforms.
Amendment 192 is a small, technical amendment. It does not compel Ofcom to add burdens to all small platforms but provides a specific recourse for the Secretary of State to consider the risks of harm as part of the process of categorisation. A small number of well-known, small high-harm sites would be required to add what will ultimately be minimal friction and other measures proportionate to their size. They will be required to deliver enhanced transparency. This can only be for the good, given that in some cases these
sites are designed specifically to spread harm and radicalise users towards extreme and even terrorist behaviours.
The Government accept that there is a problem. Internet users broadly accept that there is a problem. It must be sensible, in deciding on categorisation, to look at the risk of harm caused by the platforms. I beg to move.