\n<\/p>\n
The father of Molly Russell, a British teenager who killed herself after viewing harmful online content, has called for a change in leadership at the UK\u2019s communications watchdog after losing faith in its ability to make the internet safer for children.<\/p>\n
Ian Russell, whose 14 year-old daughter took her own life in 2017, said Ofcom had \u201crepeatedly\u201d demonstrated that it does not grasp the urgency of keeping under-18s safe online and was failing to implement new digital laws forcefully.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve lost confidence in the current leadership at Ofcom,\u201d he told the Guardian. \u201cThey have repeatedly demonstrated that they don\u2019t grasp the urgency of this task and they have shown that they don\u2019t seem to be willing to use their powers to the extent that is required.\u201d<\/p>\n
Russell\u2019s comments came in the same week the technology secretary, Liz Kendall, wrote to Ofcom saying she was \u201cdeeply concerned\u201d about delays in rolling out parts of the Online Safety Act (OSA), a landmark piece of legislation laying down safety rules for social media, search and video platforms.<\/p>\n
Russell, who has become an influential internet safety campaigner since his daughter\u2019s death, said that last year he raised concerns with Ofcom\u2019s chief executive, Melanie Dawes, about an online suicide forum accessible to UK users.<\/p>\n
Ofcom opened an investigation into the site this year, shortly after assuming new regulatory powers from the OSA, and the forum voluntarily geo-blocked access to UK users.<\/p>\n
But Russell said the investigation appeared to have \u201cstalled\u201d before the regulator ramped up its probe this month \u2013 when it emerged the forum was still available to UK users through a previously undetected \u201cmirror site\u201d.<\/p>\n
<\/span>Molly Russell died in 2017.<\/span> Photograph: PA<\/p>\n \u201cIf Ofcom can\u2019t deal with something as black and white, cut and dried as that, you have to question what else they can deal with,\u201d Russell said.<\/p>\n Ofcom addressed Russell\u2019s concerns in a letter, saying that the site\u2019s geo-block had been constantly monitored, but the mirror site \u2013 operating under a wholly different domain name \u2013 had come to the regulator\u2019s attention only this month.<\/p>\n Russell said he shared Kendall\u2019s disappointment in delays to implementing further elements of the OSA, including strict rules for the largest and most influential online platforms. Ofcom has said the delays were due to a court challenge from the Wikimedia foundation \u2013 the charity behind Wikipedia.<\/p>\n The watchdog said it had the \u201chighest respect\u201d for bereaved families and pointed to achievements under its watch, such as age checks for pornography sites and a crackdown on child sexual abuse material.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are working with urgency to drive tech firms to deliver a safer life online for children and adults in the UK, and while the job is not done, change is happening,\u201d a spokesperson said.<\/p>\n The Molly Rose Foundation, a charity founded by Molly\u2019s family, has submitted a letter to the UK government calling on ministers to extend a legal requirement for transparency from public officials to apply to tech companies as well.<\/p>\n The letter urged Alex Davies-Jones, the victims minister, to expand the remit of the public authority (accountability) bill, which introduces a \u201cduty of candour\u201d for public officials.<\/p>\n The bill, brought in after criticism of how police officers presented evidence at the Hillsborough inquiry, requires public bodies and officials to help investigations \u2013 including coroner\u2019s courts \u2013 by providing information and evidence proactively, without favouring their own position.<\/p>\n The foundation believes that requiring companies regulated by the OSA to abide by the same rules would prevent them from dragging their heels over submitting evidence in the case of a death where social media use was potentially involved.<\/p>\n The inquest into Molly\u2019s death was subject to delays owing to wrangles with Meta over submitting evidence.<\/p>\n The letter said: \u201cThis shift would fundamentally reset the relationship between tech companies and their victims \u2013 a move that would require tech companies to act transparently and expeditiously when responding to legal requests.\u201d<\/p>\n Recent legislation has bolstered coroners\u2019 powers, enabling them to demand evidence of social media use from tech companies under the OSA and prevent important data from being deleted, but the letter\u2019s signatories believe tougher powers are needed.<\/p>\n Among more than 40 signatories were members of the group Bereaved Families for Online Safety and the Meta whistleblower Arturo B\u00e9jar.<\/p>\n A government spokesperson pointed to the legal changes enhancing coroners\u2019 powers to require information from tech firms.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Online Safety Act supports coroners conducting inquests and families seeking the truth in compelling companies to share data fully where there is evidence of a link between a child\u2019s death and their social media use’,\u201d said the spokesperson.<\/p>\n \u201cAs promised in our manifesto, we have also strengthened this by also giving coroners the power to request that data is preserved to support inquests. We will not hesitate to act, and will work with families and campaigners to ensure we protect families and children.\u201d<\/p>\n In the UK, the youth suicide charity Papyrus can be contacted on 0800 068 4141 or email pat@papyrus-uk.org, and in the UK and Ireland Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is at 988 or chat for support. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The father of Molly Russell, a British teenager who killed herself after viewing harmful online content, has called for a change in leadership at the UK\u2019s communications watchdog after losing faith in its ability to make the internet safer for children. Ian Russell, whose 14 year-old daughter took her own life in 2017, said Ofcom<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33744,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[376,7505,2217,1145,154,96,205,14052,253,204,7446],"class_list":{"0":"post-33743","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-technology","8":"tag-death","9":"tag-faith","10":"tag-father","11":"tag-internet","12":"tag-linked","13":"tag-lost","14":"tag-media","15":"tag-ofcom","16":"tag-safety","17":"tag-social","18":"tag-teen"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33743","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33743"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33743\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/33744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}