Kanishka Narayan

The Prime Minister has announced that this Government will take decisive action to strengthen children’s online safety, including new expectations on technology companies to introduce crucial safety measures on children’s phones. The Government are clear that children are facing unacceptable levels of sexual harm online, including grooming, sextortion and coercion into sharing intimate images. A single image can trap a child in a cycle of abuse—something I have personally heard about from young people, families and civil society. I hold them in my mind and heart as we take action to stop this harm at source. To address this issue, we have set out expectations that technology companies introduce device-level protections for children. The protections will prevent children from taking, sharing or viewing nude imagery across all core device functionalities, including camera, messaging apps, search functions and file sharing. The protections are built directly into the operating system. We recognise that companies have already developed and implemented nudity detection on devices, and we want to work collaboratively with industry to build solutions and call on companies to take action within three months. We have been clear that if industry does not meet our high expectations, we will not hesitate to legislate. Furthermore, the Government’s “Growing up in the online world” consultation closed on 26 May. The Government are reviewing the responses and will provide an update in the coming weeks.