Last week the Online Safety Bill was finally made law - a move that the government touted as demonstrating a “zero-tolerance approach to protecting children from online harm”.
That certainly sounds like good news for those involved in safeguarding in schools, given that risky online behaviours are of increasing concern. Indeed, data from the NSPCC shows an 82 per cent increase in online grooming crimes and a 66 per cent increase in child abuse image crimes in the past five years.
But what exactly does the new law do? And what do schools need to know about it?
The big change is that technology companies, particularly social media companies, have a legal responsibility to prevent illegal content from being put on their sites, and a responsibility to remove illegal content rapidly. This refers to content ranging from terrorist activity to that encouraging or depicting violence, bullying, suicide, self-harm or eating disorders.
There is also a requirement for tech companies to enforce age limits on websites where material that is not suitable for children is being published, and to be clearer about the possible risks and dangers for young people, including with published risk assessments. In addition, they have to provide children and parents with clear ways to filter out content that they do not want to see or to report problems.
Companies can be fined up to 10 per cent of global annual revenue for falling foul of the law - so, theoretically, billions of pounds in some cases.
And the law targeting online abusers has also strengthened, making easier to convict those who share intimate images without consent, and criminalising the non-consensual creation of deep fake intimate images using AI.
While the new legislation is society-wide, it clearly has implications for school leaders and safeguarding leads. So what should schools do?
Online Safety Bill: action schools should take
1. Talk to parents
Schools should communicate with parents about the new laws. Many parents feel very disempowered when it comes to managing the online access that their children have.
Explaining to them that they will now have much more legal support when complaining about the behaviour of a company or trying to get inappropriate material taken down could help them to feel more in control in this area.
Parents’ current experience will be that unpleasant or bullying posts are almost never removed from social media, even if complaints are made to the company. So it is important that the new laws are highlighted.
2. Talk to pupils
Similarly, schools should talk with pupils about these changes to explain to them what they can do to raise a concern with a company.
Children do sometimes get things wrong online, and it would certainly be worth emphasising the strengthening of the law against people who post bullying, sexting or other illegal or inappropriate material.
It should already be known that these things can lead to criminal charges, but it would be a very good idea to reiterate this message, particularly as it applies to faked images created by AI. Young people might be under the impression that images that are not genuine photographs are treated differently.
3. Train your staff
Classroom teachers are on the front line when it comes to questions from students about appropriate use of computers in class and homework, and will doubtless be leading personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) sessions on appropriate use of social media and online dangers, such as cyberbullying, online grooming and pornography.
As such, keeping staff up to date with this new legislation is important. Even more useful would be practical training about how to respond to issues that might arise.
A good way of doing this is to role play scenarios about what staff might do when faced with different situations, showing the most appropriate action to take when confronted with an online safeguarding concern.
4. Make sure your systems work
It remains to be seen, of course, how effective restrictions like minimum limits on certain sites will be, especially in the short term.
There already are such restrictions on many sites, with little effect. So schools have to ensure that their own work in this area is effective.
It is vital to ensure that all your software monitoring and filtering technology is working as required, as laid out in Keeping Children Safe in Education 2023. The tragic death of Frankie Thomas demonstrated the dangers from not doing so.
5. Data access queries remain
One big issue with the new law is how it will be used against firms that offer encrypted private messaging services like WhatsApp. The watchdog Ofcom has been empowered to order a messaging service to use “accredited technology” to look for and take down child sexual abuse material, but it is not clear that “lower level” concerns like bullying messages would also be covered by this.
In addition, the government has said that Ofcom would only be able to intervene if scanning content is “technically feasible” and not breaching user privacy. It seems likely, then, that schools will be left to deal with misuse of these sorts of messaging services by their students.
Overall, while the new law is not a panacea, the hope is that it will give more protection to children when using the digital domain and reduce the risks they face when doing so.
Luke Ramsden is deputy head of an independent school and chair of trustees for the Schools Consent Project
