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Gender Based Violence

Asked by Dr Simon OpherLabourDepartment for Science, Innovation and TechnologyTabled Answered 17 November 2025UIN 87934

The question

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of Ofcom's Online Safety Act Illegal Content Codes of Practice on levels of online violence against women and girls.

Answered by Kanishka Narayan

Reducing online violence against women and girls and fraud are priorities for this government. Ofcom’s Illegal Harms Codes require platforms to proactively address serious illegal content, much of which disproportionately impacts women and girls. The codes also require platforms to implement strong measures to protect users against fraud.

The Government and Ofcom are actively monitoring changes to platforms' behaviour and the levels of harm experienced online following Ofcom’s codes coming into effect. This work will track the effect of the online safety regime and feed into a statutory Post Implementation Review.

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