February 17, 2020

In her blog post, the Communications Manager at IPSO, Vikki Julian, reminds readers that IPSO made a submission to the Government’s online harms consultation, which outlined concerns around regulatory duplication, unintended consequences for freedom of expression and some of the challenges presented by the complexity and changing nature of the online environment. She says that IPSO’s response “made clear that newspapers and magazines who are members of IPSO were already accountable to an independent, external regulator”.

Ms Julian notes that the Secretary of State made reassurances at the time that journalistic or editorial content would not be affected by any new regulatory framework and says that it was “pleasing to see that the consultation response had a strong focus on protecting freedom of expression and that “appropriate safeguards” to protect it would be included in any future legislation”.

Ms Julian also notes that IPSO’s regulation covers the majority of newspapers and magazines in the UK, including their online versions, under the Editors’ Code of Practice. This includes online user-generated comments “below the line” of an article. Ms Julian says that user-generated comments that are pre-moderated before being published online are considered to have gone through a process of editorial control, and would generally fall under the terms of the Editors’ Code. Where comments are not pre-moderated, if problematic comments have been brought to a publication’s attention (usually through a “report” mechanism) and remain online, they are then considered to have gone through a process of editorial control. IPSO can then consider complaints about user-generated material, after they have been reviewed or moderated by the publication.

Ms Julian says she was “particularly interested to read the response’s commentary around annual transparency reporting, particularly as IPSO-regulated publishers are already committed to a system of transparency reporting through our annual statements system”.

Ms Julian also welcomes the Government’s commitment to a media literacy strategy and says that IPSO looks forward to its publication later in the year. “As one of the biggest content regulators in the UK, we are supportive of initiatives to improve media literacy and keen to contribute to the discussions in this area.”

Ms Julian says that IPSO wants all citizens to have appropriate levels of media literacy to make informed decisions about what sorts of news they would like to access. They should be able to identify and avoid harmful fake news, and know how to identify curated and edited content displaying high-quality journalism. IPSO would also expect consumers to have awareness of the methods available to seek redress from the regulated press when journalists do get things wrong.

Ms Julian acknowledges that there are “many challenges to implementing proposals designed to make the internet safer. Where new regulatory frameworks are created, care must be taken to avoid regulatory duplication or overly burdensome regulation – whilst also ensuring that freedom of expression is properly protected”. To read the blog post in full, click here.