#osa
#UK online safety law #Musk hates kicks in today, and so far, #Trump can’t stop it
Enforcement of a first-of-its-kind #UnitedKingdom law that #ElonMusk wants #DonaldTrump to gut kicked in today, with potentially huge penalties possibly imminent for any Big Tech companies deemed non-compliant.
UK's #OnlineSafetyAct ( #OSA ) forces tech companies to detect and remove dangerous online content, threatening fines of up to 10 percent of global turnover.
#socialmedia
Lobsters about the risks of the Online Safety Act for them :
https://lobste.rs/s/ukosa1/uk_users_lobsters_needs_your_help_with#c_xevn8a #OSA #UK
@arstechnica The #OnlineSafetyAct can't be all bad, apparently 'officials on Trump's team "hate" the OSA and view it as "Orwellian."'
#osa #musk #trump #xitter
Ofcom’s risk assessment deadline has passed, and online platforms must now take action to protect users from illegal content and activity occurring on their platforms. Significant fines await those who fail.
https://www.computing.co.uk/news-analysis/2025/new-online-safety-act-measures-come-into-force
Great read
"The Online Safety Act reads to me as a profoundly ironic tragedy. #Ofcom constantly reiterates that huge, vague swaths of expression are “illegal, harmful content” while, to me, almost everything they’ve written about the #OSA is illegal, harmful content. The OSA exercises prior restraint and enables jawboning for a deliberate chilling effect, placing an undue burden that would never withstand strict scrutiny let alone justify unreasonable search and seizure"
https://lobste.rs/s/ukosa1/uk_users_lobsters_needs_your_help_with#c_xevn8a
@girlonthenet Over a month ago I posted a question on https://meta.stackoverflow.com asking how they intended to respond to the OSA. I just got a few comments from people who clearly didn't understand the situation and then the question was deleted. 
#osa #OnlineSafetyAct #stackoverflow
UK’s internet watchdog puts storage and file-sharing services on watch over CSAM - https://techcrunch.com/2025/03/17/uks-internet-watchdog-puts-storage-and-file-sharing-services-on-watch-over-csam/ "regulator said its evidence shows that file-sharing and file-storage services are “particularly susceptible” to being used" #osa
I have considered setting up my personal Mastodon instance on a Raspberry Pi since last year - even considering technical challenges and the amount of time it will take to manage it
but now, seeing and reading how much pain the Online Safety Act rules are causing... screw that
congrats to Labour, Tories & other clueless politicians who lobbied and/or voted for that "world leading bill" - because of it, centralised platforms will only grow stronger
lobste.rs decides not to geoblock the UK “for now”.
“I’ve disabled the pending geoblock of the UK because I now think the risks of the Online Safety Act to this site are low enough to change strategies to only geoblock if directly threatened by the regulator.”
(The OSA is still a pending disaster for anyone running small sites - I’m currently running mine under the assumption that because a) they’re too small to count and b) they’re either just me or are immediate family with no open registration, they don’t count for OSA purposes. But who knows?)
https://lobste.rs/s/ukosa1/uk_users_lobsters_needs_your_help_with#c_xevn8a
Any CPAP users out there wanna recommend me a mask to try that doesn't make me feel like I'm being suffocated with a pillow? Shit is not pleasant.
Reminder: #Fediverse and #Mastodon is largely run by individuals who have to deal with the technical gubbins as well as the administrative stuff like the new UK #OSA regulations.
Unlike other platforms, you can move platforms easily (as I did a while back), and have a dialogue with the mods. I just lobbed a few quid a month towards maintenance and the hard work of @Floppy and the crew.
first Apple, now Google possibly getting TCN from UK gov't? this is completely mental if true.
they're only makes things worse with this shit, and not just for its citizens: other govt's will take notice of such tactics and may begin using it.
with this & Online Safety Act mess, UK giv't is genuinely wrecking any online freedom
The bulk copy/pasting is done, now I'm into the difficult bit of actually justifying the assessment. Ooh what's that shiny thing over there? #OSA
Small, low-risk sites should be out of scope so long as providers have a reasonable belief that children will not come across harmful material on them, say campaigners.
challenging myself to write a manuscript so obscene that OFCOM are forced to act
The Online Safety Act was debated in Westminster Hall today. Lot of MPs not happy with the way it's going, but mainly not for the reasons many of us are hereabouts.
Start here https://www.parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/e929a7c1-15b3-4ff3-ab09-acb5171dbccb
However there was at least one speaker, Kirsty Blackman MP, who'd clearly read the email we sent our MP about #OSA as she talked about the issue of proportionality and repeatedly refers to "a hill walking forum which gets three posts a week" (that's us that is).
Start here https://parliamentlive.tv/event/index/e929a7c1-15b3-4ff3-ab09-acb5171dbccb?in=10:24:53
@cyberleagle Watched this parliamentary debate on the implementation of the Online Safety Act. Lots of concern legitimately expressed about Ofcom not going far enough with large and/or high-risk platforms. But only Kirstie Blackman also mentioned the disproportionate impact on small, low-risk platforms.
#osa #OnlineSafetyAct #ukpolitics