Committee publication · Correspondence · 17 June 2025
Letter from Dame Melanie Dawes DCB, Chief Executive, and Lord Grade, Chair, Ofcom, regarding oral evidence follow-up, dated 13 June 2025
From: Culture, Media and Sport Committee
Inquiry: The work of Ofcom
Summary
Ofcom's Chief Executive and Chair provide written follow-up to oral evidence given to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee in May 2025. They detail how transparency reporting duties under the Online Safety Act will require major social media and search services to publish annual safety data, enabling public comparison and informed decision-making. They also commit to providing a fuller update on Media Act implementation before summer recess.
Key findings
- Categorised services (major social media and search platforms) must publish annual transparency reports on platform safety; Ofcom will issue annual transparency notices specifying required information.
- Ofcom will produce its own annual transparency report summarising industry trends and good practices, enabling public, academia, media, and civil society to assess service safety and comparative performance.
- Transparency reports may compel disclosure of prevalence of illegal content, user exposure to such content, and effectiveness of child protection features, tailored by service type and user demographics.
- Information disclosed will be standardised selectively to enable comparison while reflecting different service designs and operational models.
- Ofcom commits to publishing a series of consultations and reports on Media Act implementation, with a full update to the Committee before summer recess.
Tone
ProceduralTopics
Key actors
Dame Melanie Dawes, Lord Grade, Dame Caroline Dinenage MP, Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, Ofcom
Notable line
“Consumers will be able to judge whether firms are doing enough to make their platforms safe and how different services compare to each other.”
Key Quotes
“This means that, for the first time in the UK, services must publish detailed information about the safety of their platforms for all to see.”
“Consumers will be able to judge whether firms are doing enough to make their platforms safe and how different services compare to each other.”
“… data we could compel companies to disclose might include, for example: how prevalent illegal content is on their service, how many users have come across such content, and the effectiveness of features used by a platform to protect children.”
Source · parliament.uk record ↗