- Joined
- Aug 19, 2008
- Messages
- 37,713
- Points
- 113
http://data.parliament.uk/writtenev.../disinformation-and-fake-news/oral/92924.html
Q4292 Chair: Edwin Tong.
Edwin Tong: Good afternoon, Ms Denham. Thank you very much for being here and for the note that you sent to the Committee before today. I have a couple of questions that arise from what you have said here. In one of the points you made—I am not sure which page it is on, perhaps the second full page of the note—you say that a co-ordinated approach needs to be taken to internet harms. By that, I take it you mean that we need not only regulation and legislation, like you spoke about a short while ago, but a range of other measures, such as media literacy, improving standards of journalism, making sure that schools teach our children the right approach to being more discerning online, and so on. Would I be correct?
Elizabeth Denham: I think it is complicated to say how we are going to address the kind of harms that the public are concerned about—everything from misinformation to disinformation to opaque advertising in the political arena to kids spending too much time online to data privacy; all those issues. But digital literacy and digital media are really important, and they make us all a little bit more diligent in how we read things online and understand them. We also need transparency and more regulation. There are so many different aspects to this. When you look at the political context, which has been the focus of our investigation, we have some very specific recommendations.
Edwin Tong: I understand. So what you’re saying is that there is no single, silver bullet, but there has to be a suite of measures to tackle this problem. Is that correct?
Elizabeth Denham: You said it very well. I think there are many actors in this space, including citizens, the education system, the social media companies and Parliament.
Edwin Tong: On the question of legislation, your report mentions that there are still a number of internet harms that do not appear to be fully addressed by current law and regulation. You cite the fact that harmful conduct online, which currently might be legal, needs to be dealt with. Can you elaborate on that?
Elizabeth Denham: Obviously, countries have defined illegal online conduct. The issue is how that is enforced. How quickly do social media companies and online platforms remove, and deal with, illegal content? The gap is actually in content that is legal but might be offensive to certain individuals—kids are a good example. The public are looking for legislators to find the right regulatory approach that deals with online harm but also protects freedom of expression and innovation and balances those processes.
Edwin Tong: Would you seek regulation to protect, say, children and the general public from content that could be seditious or incite hatred?
Elizabeth Denham: That is correct. Although it is complicated and complex to come up with the rules that will balance all these interests, our research shows that the public expect Parliament and legislators to do that.
Edwin Tong: The sense is that some kind of legislation needs to be enacted to deal with those online harms and to define the parameters. To borrow your language, you say that online non-criminal harms could be as significant as criminal harms because of the scale of potential activities. I think you mean the proliferation of material on the internet—the quick spread of such information online. Is that right?
Elizabeth Denham: That is exactly right. We are especially concerned about children and vulnerable adults.
***
Chair: Sun Xueling.
Sun Xueling: You have mentioned that regulations should be a backstop to regulate content and conduct. Would you agree, then, that there is a need for a framework to bind tech companies and regulators to collectively address this information and online falsehoods?
Elizabeth Denham: A collective action between regulators and companies?
Sun Xueling: A framework to bind tech companies and regulators together.
Elizabeth Denham: I believe that the time for self-regulation in this context is over. My recommendation to the Committee for consideration is that, because of the public concern about these internet harms around content and conduct online, Parliament needs to define the outcomes. There needs to be a set of standards that are agreed and a regulator has to be equipped with the right powers to be able to review the activities of the companies.
The complexities of the different platforms is something to take into account. Snap is different and has different operating processes to Facebook or to Google. That is why I think the platforms have to have some overall standards that they have to comply with, but they have to be judged in the context of who they are serving. With a platform that is operating and serving kids, for example, there would be some different requirements.
To be clear, I am not advocating for a self-regulatory model. I am advocating for a strong regulatory backdrop to a set of standards.
***
Chair: Pritam Singh.
Pritam Singh: The realm of fake news and disinformation is not just the domain of opaque social media companies. In this social media age, marked by technological innovation, it can be argued that opaque Governments precipitate the formation of a vacuum, which is then abused by peddlers of disinformation and fake news. Given your experience, what advice would you give Governments in general and opaque Governments in particular around the world that seek to move in the direction of open government? Secondly, and closely associated, how does open government better inoculate a citizenry against disinformation and fake news?
Steve Wood: That is a question we are quite happy to answer as well because the other piece of legislation we are responsible for as a regulator is the Freedom of Information Act in the UK. Governments setting an example of putting as much factual information into the public domain to support and inform debate so that that provides a rich seam of information, which can support debate, and Governments showing the way by being open and proactively responding to freedom of information requests that citizens may make, and that being part of a fact-checking process, is probably another part of the jigsaw that can set an important standard. As we have discussed already today, it is another lever that can help improve the environment. I think if a Government are legislating in this area, a good way for the Government to set the standard is to show how they themselves are being open. That also means embracing new technologies and it is about open data and very much explaining how data can be used to understand the workings of the Government and making that available to civil society and so on. Governments certainly have a role to play in that wider debate, as one part of the jigsaw.
Pritam Singh: You spoke about fact-checking. That is one of the recommendations that our Select Committee in Singapore looked into. It is not so simple, because there are questions about who finances and funds it, and questions of that nature. If you have the Government funding it, there are questions about an obvious conflict of interest there.
What advice would you give to countries that are considering fact-checking platforms, particularly small countries such as Singapore, where the media landscape or media companies—I wouldn’t say don’t have deep pockets, because some media companies do, but where there is obviously a conflicted party driving that fact-checking process? There are contradictions.
Steve Wood: You are certainly right that it is a balance. Equally, you do not want to have a Ministry of Truth and an overarching body that decides the factual basis that people might seek to complain about. Certainly, having a strong regime for the regulation of national statistics, which we have in the UK, is a good basis to start. There are some core areas where data is particularly quoted as a central area of national debate. It is also about having a strong, vigorous civil society of fact-checking groups, as well as starting to pioneer some ways to do that and to use large datasets. Fact-checking can often be complicated, with big claims. I guess the UK, like a lot of other countries, is finding its way, but I think at the core there has always been a bedrock. I am thinking particularly of official statistics; there is a high degree of confidence in that area, which the UK has led strongly on.
****
Pritam's questions rock. Loser Tong and Sun!
Q4292 Chair: Edwin Tong.
Edwin Tong: Good afternoon, Ms Denham. Thank you very much for being here and for the note that you sent to the Committee before today. I have a couple of questions that arise from what you have said here. In one of the points you made—I am not sure which page it is on, perhaps the second full page of the note—you say that a co-ordinated approach needs to be taken to internet harms. By that, I take it you mean that we need not only regulation and legislation, like you spoke about a short while ago, but a range of other measures, such as media literacy, improving standards of journalism, making sure that schools teach our children the right approach to being more discerning online, and so on. Would I be correct?
Elizabeth Denham: I think it is complicated to say how we are going to address the kind of harms that the public are concerned about—everything from misinformation to disinformation to opaque advertising in the political arena to kids spending too much time online to data privacy; all those issues. But digital literacy and digital media are really important, and they make us all a little bit more diligent in how we read things online and understand them. We also need transparency and more regulation. There are so many different aspects to this. When you look at the political context, which has been the focus of our investigation, we have some very specific recommendations.
Edwin Tong: I understand. So what you’re saying is that there is no single, silver bullet, but there has to be a suite of measures to tackle this problem. Is that correct?
Elizabeth Denham: You said it very well. I think there are many actors in this space, including citizens, the education system, the social media companies and Parliament.
Edwin Tong: On the question of legislation, your report mentions that there are still a number of internet harms that do not appear to be fully addressed by current law and regulation. You cite the fact that harmful conduct online, which currently might be legal, needs to be dealt with. Can you elaborate on that?
Elizabeth Denham: Obviously, countries have defined illegal online conduct. The issue is how that is enforced. How quickly do social media companies and online platforms remove, and deal with, illegal content? The gap is actually in content that is legal but might be offensive to certain individuals—kids are a good example. The public are looking for legislators to find the right regulatory approach that deals with online harm but also protects freedom of expression and innovation and balances those processes.
Edwin Tong: Would you seek regulation to protect, say, children and the general public from content that could be seditious or incite hatred?
Elizabeth Denham: That is correct. Although it is complicated and complex to come up with the rules that will balance all these interests, our research shows that the public expect Parliament and legislators to do that.
Edwin Tong: The sense is that some kind of legislation needs to be enacted to deal with those online harms and to define the parameters. To borrow your language, you say that online non-criminal harms could be as significant as criminal harms because of the scale of potential activities. I think you mean the proliferation of material on the internet—the quick spread of such information online. Is that right?
Elizabeth Denham: That is exactly right. We are especially concerned about children and vulnerable adults.
***
Chair: Sun Xueling.
Sun Xueling: You have mentioned that regulations should be a backstop to regulate content and conduct. Would you agree, then, that there is a need for a framework to bind tech companies and regulators to collectively address this information and online falsehoods?
Elizabeth Denham: A collective action between regulators and companies?
Sun Xueling: A framework to bind tech companies and regulators together.
Elizabeth Denham: I believe that the time for self-regulation in this context is over. My recommendation to the Committee for consideration is that, because of the public concern about these internet harms around content and conduct online, Parliament needs to define the outcomes. There needs to be a set of standards that are agreed and a regulator has to be equipped with the right powers to be able to review the activities of the companies.
The complexities of the different platforms is something to take into account. Snap is different and has different operating processes to Facebook or to Google. That is why I think the platforms have to have some overall standards that they have to comply with, but they have to be judged in the context of who they are serving. With a platform that is operating and serving kids, for example, there would be some different requirements.
To be clear, I am not advocating for a self-regulatory model. I am advocating for a strong regulatory backdrop to a set of standards.
***
Chair: Pritam Singh.
Pritam Singh: The realm of fake news and disinformation is not just the domain of opaque social media companies. In this social media age, marked by technological innovation, it can be argued that opaque Governments precipitate the formation of a vacuum, which is then abused by peddlers of disinformation and fake news. Given your experience, what advice would you give Governments in general and opaque Governments in particular around the world that seek to move in the direction of open government? Secondly, and closely associated, how does open government better inoculate a citizenry against disinformation and fake news?
Steve Wood: That is a question we are quite happy to answer as well because the other piece of legislation we are responsible for as a regulator is the Freedom of Information Act in the UK. Governments setting an example of putting as much factual information into the public domain to support and inform debate so that that provides a rich seam of information, which can support debate, and Governments showing the way by being open and proactively responding to freedom of information requests that citizens may make, and that being part of a fact-checking process, is probably another part of the jigsaw that can set an important standard. As we have discussed already today, it is another lever that can help improve the environment. I think if a Government are legislating in this area, a good way for the Government to set the standard is to show how they themselves are being open. That also means embracing new technologies and it is about open data and very much explaining how data can be used to understand the workings of the Government and making that available to civil society and so on. Governments certainly have a role to play in that wider debate, as one part of the jigsaw.
Pritam Singh: You spoke about fact-checking. That is one of the recommendations that our Select Committee in Singapore looked into. It is not so simple, because there are questions about who finances and funds it, and questions of that nature. If you have the Government funding it, there are questions about an obvious conflict of interest there.
What advice would you give to countries that are considering fact-checking platforms, particularly small countries such as Singapore, where the media landscape or media companies—I wouldn’t say don’t have deep pockets, because some media companies do, but where there is obviously a conflicted party driving that fact-checking process? There are contradictions.
Steve Wood: You are certainly right that it is a balance. Equally, you do not want to have a Ministry of Truth and an overarching body that decides the factual basis that people might seek to complain about. Certainly, having a strong regime for the regulation of national statistics, which we have in the UK, is a good basis to start. There are some core areas where data is particularly quoted as a central area of national debate. It is also about having a strong, vigorous civil society of fact-checking groups, as well as starting to pioneer some ways to do that and to use large datasets. Fact-checking can often be complicated, with big claims. I guess the UK, like a lot of other countries, is finding its way, but I think at the core there has always been a bedrock. I am thinking particularly of official statistics; there is a high degree of confidence in that area, which the UK has led strongly on.
****
Pritam's questions rock. Loser Tong and Sun!
Sibei song!
