(February 26, 2ß25)

The rules affect thousands of businesses of all sizes worldwide, far exceeding the scope of the EU’s Digital Safety Act (DSA) and similar online safety frameworks. Companies that view the OSA as the “UK‘s DSA” may be surprised to learn that it applies to a much wider range of tech businesses, not just the biggest global platforms.

In fact, it applies to more than 100,000 user-to-user (U2U) and search services providers that target the UK market or have many UK users — including social media apps, video sharing platforms (VSPs), private messaging apps, online marketplaces, gaming sites, search engines and others — even if they’re small or based overseas.

(December 16, 2024)

The act places new safety requirements on social media platforms, search engines, messaging, gaming and dating apps, and pornographic and file-sharing sites.

Websites and apps covered by the law have until March 16 of next year to “complete an assessment to understand the risks illegal content poses to children and adults on their platform,” the release said.

The law lists more than 130 “priority offenses.” Companies that fail to comply could be fined up to 10% of global annual turnover or up to 18 million pounds (about $22.8 million), whichever number is greater.

The U.K. adopted the Online Safety Bill last year after a lengthy period of debate.