8 NEWSFEED Updates & Upgrades
UK GOVERNMENT ASSIGNS TV WATCHDOG TO REGULATE THE INTERNET
The British government is to appoint Ofcom as an internet watchdog, giving it the ability to fine social media companies that do not protect users from harmful content. It will oversee two specific areas covering illegal and harmful content. For the former, it will make sure companies quickly take down illegal content – with a focus on terrorism and child abuse imagery – and prevent much of it being posted in the first place. For the latter, Ofcom will make social networks enforce their own terms and conditions. This censorship comes from a lack of regulation over these areas. For illegal content, social networks
see a flurry of small changes, with the more meaningful changes taking years to work through courts. However, social networks have warned anything that imposes requirements on them to take down content quickly runs the risk of encouraging them to remove false positives, content that is not infringing, but looks close to being. Failure to comply will result in “fair, proportionate and transparent” penalties. The white paper suggested individual executives may be held to account for failures, but the government has not set out any specific policies and will not do so until it finalises its response in the spring.
currently believe that they are free from all penalties provided they are not seen to be actively supporting the content. For harmful content, the government says it needs to act to protect children
online and create a legal duty of care on the behalf of social networks, to ensure they face penalties for harms their platforms cause. On the day the law comes into practice, users will likely
BBC MAKES CUTS TO NEWS STAFF
The BBC has said it will cut 450 jobs from its news operation and cover fewer stories as part of an effort to save £80m by 2022. Head of news, Fran Unsworth, announced that journalists at the organisation would be pooled in centralised teams rather than working for specific programmes, with an increased emphasis on its online output rather than television and radio. Newsnight, Radio 5 Live and the Victoria Derbyshire programme will be among the worst affected, although the impact will be felt across the board, with management still deciding where hundreds of redundancies will fall. Unsworth said the BBC was covering about 100 different news stories a day across all platforms and this was “overwhelming” the public, with many stories not reaching
It’s estimated that around 6% of British households watch TV without a valid licence, the penalty for which is a £1000 fine. But Boris Johnson’s government is considering decriminalising the licence fee, downgrading non-payment to a civil debt with enforcement made through civil courts, and enforced using bailiffs. However, decriminalisation of the licence fee risks £200m of BBC revenue, resulting in further cuts. “Such a politically motivated move – dressed up as a concern for the mythical imprisonment of vulnerable members of society – will serve to undermine one of the UK’s strongest success stories, emasculating a brand renowned and respected across the globe,” said Michelle Stanistreet, general secretary of the National Union of Journalists.
intended audiences. “Producing fewer stories means we have to be a smaller organisation,” she told staff, emphasising the BBC was under attack from changing media habits, claims of bias and threats to its funding. The BBC is funded by the licence fee, established in 1923 for the owners of radio sets. It costs UK TV owners £154.50 a year and pays for the BBC’s TV, radio and online operations.
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