Online Safety Act 2023

114 Co-operation and disclosure of information: overseas regulators

(1) OFCOM may co-operate with an overseas regulator, including by disclosing online safety information to that regulator, for the purposes of—

(a) facilitating the exercise by the overseas regulator of any of that regulator’s online regulatory functions, or

(b) criminal investigations or proceedings relating to a matter to which the overseas regulator’s online regulatory functions relate.

(2) The power conferred by subsection (1) applies only in relation to an overseas regulator for the time being specified in regulations made by the Secretary of State.

(3) Where information is disclosed to a person in reliance on subsection (1), the person may not—

(a) use the information for a purpose other than the purpose for which it was disclosed, or

(b) further disclose the information,

except with OFCOM’s consent (which may be general or specific) or in accordance with an order of a court or tribunal.

(4) Except as provided by subsection (5), a disclosure of information under subsection (1) does not breach—

(a) any obligation of confidence owed by the person making the disclosure, or

(b) any other restriction on the disclosure of information (however imposed).

(5) Subsection (1) does not authorise a disclosure of information that—

(a) would contravene the restriction imposed by section 116 (intelligence service information),

(b) would contravene the data protection legislation (but in determining whether a disclosure would do so, the power conferred by that subsection is to be taken into account), or

(c) is prohibited by any of Parts 1 to 7 or Chapter 1 of Part 9 of the Investigatory Powers Act 2016.

(6) Section 18 of the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 (restriction on disclosure of information for overseas purposes) has effect in relation to a disclosure authorised by subsection (1)(b) as it has effect in relation to a disclosure authorised by any of the provisions to which section 17 of that Act applies.

(7) In this section—

• “online regulatory functions”, in relation to an overseas regulator, means functions of that regulator which correspond to OFCOM’s online safety functions;

• “online safety information” means information held by OFCOM in connection with any of OFCOM’s online safety functions;

• “overseas regulator” means a person exercising functions in a country outside the United Kingdom which correspond to any of OFCOM’s online safety functions;

• “the data protection legislation” has the same meaning as in the Data Protection Act 2018 (see section 3 of that Act).