Global online safety regulators map out vision to improve international coordination

More countries also join regulatory network as cross-border collaboration continues to grow

Online safety regulators from around the world have today outlined their vision for how international regulatory approaches to online safety can be more coherent and coordinated.  

The Global Online Safety Regulators Network brings together 18 regulators and observers from five continents. The Network has today published its second position statement on how regulators will work together to address the global nature of online safety regulation.

While each of the countries in the Network has its own domestic online safety regime, neither the risks people face online nor the online services they use are confined to national or continental borders. For those reasons, we are working together on developing our regulatory capability and approaches, to achieve the outcomes set out in our respective online safety rules.

Although our regulatory regimes differ in some ways, our frameworks are similar in several key respects.

By mapping the similarities in our regulatory remits, the Network has identified opportunities in multiple areas to pursue coherence between our respective regimes. These include:

• Regulatory tools: We will aim to develop common metrics for our risk assessment methodologies and evaluation approaches, to minimise unwarranted divergences between them.
• User complaints: Those of us collecting user complaints will share our experience and evidence. Where there are instances of systemic non-compliance across jurisdictions, the Network might consider working more closely on investigations and enforcement action.
• Information requests: We will aim to produce more comparable global data that better informs our trend analysis, by coordinating in relation to the types of questions we ask of industry as part of our regulatory activities
• Safety measures: We will aim to identify a common set of reasonable steps services can take to address specific harms and risk factors by drawing on our experiences of good practice

Online Safety Commissioner for Coimisiún na Meán, Niamh Hodnett, said: “Working in partnership with our fellow global regulators is critical to help us reach our goal of making the online space safer for all users. Since the internet has no borders, our joint activities and workstreams with online safety regulators around the world enable us to share learnings and foster a coherent regulatory framework.”

Notes: 

The Global Online Safety Regulators Network is a collaboration between the first movers in online safety regulation. The Network paves the way for a coherent international approach to online safety regulation, by enabling online safety regulators to share insights, experience and best practices.  

Current Network members include: 

• eSafety Commissioner – Australia
• Online Safety Commission – Fiji
• Arcom – France
• Coimisiún na Meán – Ireland
• Korea Communications Standards Commission – Republic of Korea
• Council for Media Services – Slovakia
• Film and Publication Board – South Africa
• Office of Communications (Ofcom) (Chair) – United Kingdom

Members share a commitment to act independently of commercial and political influence and adhere to objective criteria for respect for human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. The Network is also open to observers – specifically organisations that have expertise and interest with online safety regulation and who wish to follow and engage with the Network. 

Current observers include: 

• 5Rights – Global
• Canadian Centre for Child Protection – Canada
• Department of Canadian Heritage – Canada
• European Parliament Intergroup on Children’s Rights – EU
• Family Online Safety Institute – Global
• Freiwillige Selbstkontrolle Multimedia-Diensteanbieter e.V. (FSM) – Germany
• INHOPE – Global
• Netsafe – New Zealand
• Te Mana Whakaatu | Classification Office – New Zealand
• WeProtect Global Alliance – Global

For further information about the Global Online Safety Regulators Network please contact the current Chair, Ofcom at ofcom.international@ofcom.org.uk.