UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA)

Guvnor

Guvnor

The Guvnor
Staff member
The UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA) was passed into law in 2023 and is now being implemented, with the first parts of it going into effect in March 2025.

As a small site we still have to comply with less arduous requirements, but they are still significant and we are looking for solutions.

As a community I'd like to ask you all for productive and helpful insights and suggestions.

Links to resources will be very helpful.


Note we use the Xenforo software.


Possible Forum Template


Ofcom checker


Clouflare CSAM scanner

 
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Charlie did post an update to indicate that his blog comments may survive:

Update: According to this in-depth article about the Act there appears to be a limited exemption for "limited functionality services" that covers blog comments—"but it may not include them if users can reply to each other - this is unclear". Ofcom are expected to clarify their regulations in January, so we can live in hope for a little longer. Also: "The OSA puts obligations on the service provider, so if you host a community on a platform such as Discord or WhatsApp, the OSA doesn't directly affect you." (So I may be able to open a forum on Discord instead.) Also: my quick first pass risk assessment per Ofcom guidelines is that this blog is, to put it mildly, at low risk for priority illegal content, if only because it doesn't provide most of the types of communication channel Ofcom is concerned with (eg. generating and hosting video and images, enabling direct 1:1 private communication between users).
Click to expand...

But the regulation documents are huge, so without proper clarification from the regulator, it is a lot of guesswork for now.
 
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