A new citizen-led initiative dubbed SafeWebLK was recently launched with the aim of setting up a Code of Practice pertaining to online safety. This is in particular to how global internet companies self-regulate content originating from Sri Lanka. As such, the initiative will work together with these global companies to agree to a set of commitments on responses to issues around disinformation, hate speech, and online harassment.
By January 2021, Sri Lanka reported an internet penetration rate at 50.8% of the population, which is an 800,000 increase year on year. By June the same year, there were 2.359 million fixed broadband subscriptions along with 18.269 million mobile broadband subscriptions. It’s no secret that the pandemic continues to push more towards the digital sphere with online education and remote work taking precedence. Thereby, online safety is increasingly becoming a crucial element.
Yes, most tech platforms have their own set of community guidelines that look to curb misinformation, hate speech, and other forms of similar toxicities. However, these guidelines will only go so far and it often fails to protect communities and individuals at a local level like Sri Lanka. This is where SafeWebLK aims to step in.
The SafeWebLK initiative is an effort by think tank Factum while the global tech company collaboration will be facilitated through the Asia Internet Coalition. “The Asia Internet Coalition (AIC) is committed to working with the industry partners towards building a self-regulatory framework that will pave the way forward in developing Sri Lanka’s Code of Practice for Online Safety and Harms”, says AIC Managing Director Jeff Paine.
Rising need for legislative protection
Countries around the world are already looking to introduce their own code of practices as well as regulations for global tech players in specific markets. For instance, in 2016, the European Union introduced a Code of Conduct as a means to prevent and counter the spread of illegal hate speech online. At the time, the EU Commission came to an agreement with Facebook, Microsoft, YouTube, and Twitter until Snapchat and LinkedIn joined years later.
By 2020, the Australian government introduced legislation of its own that set up a mandatory code of conduct for online platforms operating in the country. One notable implication of the code compels platforms like Facebook and Google to publicly inform when major changes are made to algorithms that affect the display of news content.
The UK is also drafting legislature to tackle this space with its Online Safety Bill and the Digital Markets Unit. In fact, UK’s Online Safety Bill expanded its coverage to handle scam ads too.
As more people go digital and grow their reliance on social media, more regulatory bodies around the world are likely to introduce similar regulatory measures. Sri Lanka is among the latest to take this route.
SafeWebLK: Drafting Sri Lanka’s Code of Practice for online platforms
SafeWebLK officially kicked off on March 16 which includes a public call for written inputs and consultations with noteworthy stakeholder groups. Once the Code of Practice is drafted, the document is to be made public on Factum’s website for review.
As per Nalaka Gunawardene, who heads Factum’s core group that will oversee SafeWebLK’s process, “Industry Codes of Practice represent the next level of self-regulation, where multiple tech companies publicly commit to the same framework to improve content monitoring in one country or region.”
While SafeWebLK looks to work on an industry Code of Practice for online safety, it’s worth noting that Sri Lanka has a rocky relationship with social media in general. This is true for both at government as well as at an individual level. Incidents like the death of youth over a TikTok video or this cyberbullying incident from 2018 demonstrate how deep this problem is and that there’s a lot of work to be done in this space. Time will tell how exactly the SafeWebLK initiative will address many of these issues. But for now, this is an important step in the right direction.
Source: NewsWire
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