[Festro]

This further exposes just how pointless and ill-thought out the Online Safety Act was in the UK. It does nothing to actually limit harm at the source, and empower the UK's public body's to take immediate action.

Ironic that the minister who spearheaded that awful bill (Peter Kyle) as Tech minister is now being the government spokesperson for this debacle as Business Minister. The UK needs someone who knows how tech and business works to tackle this, and that's not Peter Kyle.

A platform suspension in the UK should have been swift, with clear terms for how X can be reinstated. As much as it appears Musk is doubling down on letting Grok produce CSAM as some form of free speech, the UK government should treat it as a limited breach or bug that the vendor needs to resolve, whilst taking action to block the site causing harm until they've fixed it.

Letting X and Grok continue to do harm, and get free PR, is just the worst case scenario for all involved.

[roryirvine]

The draft Online Safety Bill was first published in 2021, was substantially re-written and re-introduced in early 2022, was amended over the course of the next 18 months, and eventually passed into law as the Online Safety Act in October 2023.

Peter Kyle was in opposition until July 2024, so how could he have spearheaded it?

[Festro]

Because he implemented it under his tenure in July 2025. He didn't come up with it, he spearheaded its actual implementation. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

[tonyedgecombe]

The first conviction under the bill was March 2024 so that makes no sense.

[Festro]

Why would it make no sense? Like many bills/acts, it came into effect in stages. You're referring to new laws/crimes that came into effect in January 2024.

I'm referring to the Act's powers to compel companies to actually do things in my original comment. I don't know exactly when various parts came into effect that would constitute that, but for the point of my post I'm going on Peter Kyle's own website's dated reference to holding companies accountable.

"As of the 24th July 2025, platforms now have a legal duty to protect children"

https://www.peterkyle.co.uk/blog/2025/07/25/online-safety-ac...

I don't understand why people are taking issue with that. Peter Kyle is the minister who delivered the measures from the bill that a lot of people are angry about and this latest issue on X is just another red flag that the bill is poorly worded and thought out putting too much emphasis on ID age checks for citizens than actually stopping any abuse. Peter Kyle is the one who called out objections to the bill as being on the "side of predators". Peter Kyle is now the one, despite having moved department, who is somehow commenting on this issue.

Totally happy to call out the Tories, and prior ministers who worked on the Bill/Act but Kyle implemented it, made reckless comments about, and now is trying to look proactive about an issue it covers that it's so ineffectively applying to.

[chrisjj]

> this latest issue on X is just another red flag that the bill is poorly worded and thought out putting too much emphasis on ID age checks for citizens than actually stopping any abuse.

The bill is designed to protect children from extreme sexual violence, extreme pornography and CSAM.

Not to protect adults from bikinification.

It is working as designed.

[blitzar]

Partisan politics has rotted peoples brains, I wonder if it is by design to lower peoples critical thinking skills or if it is just a fringe benefit from the tribalism it creates.

[PearlRiver]

Reminds me of something emperor Trump said. "I can shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue and they will still vote for me".

Sometimes people just dig themselves into a hole and they start going off the deep end. Why did it take until 1944 for someone to blow up Hitler?

[chrisjj]

The OSA very much does empower action e.g. against images of extreme sexual violence and extreme pornography.

It does not empower platform suspension for bikinification.

And there's as yet no substantiation of your claim Grok produces CSAM.