Online Safety Act 2023

62 “Priority content that is harmful to children” U.K.

(1) “Priority content that is harmful to children” means content of any of the following kinds.

(2) Content which is abusive and which targets any of the following characteristics—

(a) race,

(b) religion,

(c) sex,

(d) sexual orientation,

(e) disability, or

(f) gender reassignment.

(3) Content which incites hatred against people—

(a) of a particular race, religion, sex or sexual orientation,

(b) who have a disability, or

(c) who have the characteristic of gender reassignment.

(4) Content which encourages, promotes or provides instructions for an act of serious violence against a person.

(5) Bullying content.

(6) Content which—

(a) depicts real or realistic serious violence against a person;

(b) depicts the real or realistic serious injury of a person in graphic detail.

(7) Content which—

(a) depicts real or realistic serious violence against an animal;

(b) depicts the real or realistic serious injury of an animal in graphic detail;

(c) realistically depicts serious violence against a fictional creature or the serious injury of a fictional creature in graphic detail.

(8) Content which encourages, promotes or provides instructions for a challenge or stunt highly likely to result in serious injury to the person who does it or to someone else.

(9) Content which encourages a person to ingest, inject, inhale or in any other way self-administer—

(a) a physically harmful substance;

(b) a substance in such a quantity as to be physically harmful.

(10) In subsections (2) and (3)—

(a) “disability” means any physical or mental impairment;

(b) “race” includes colour, nationality, and ethnic or national origins;

(c) references to religion include references to a lack of religion.

(11) For the purposes of subsection (3), a person has the characteristic of gender reassignment if the person is proposing to undergo, is undergoing or has undergone a process (or part of a process) for the purpose of reassigning the person’s sex by changing physiological or other attributes of sex, and the reference to gender reassignment in subsection (2) is to be construed accordingly.

(12) For the purposes of subsection (5) content may, in particular, be “bullying content” if it is content targeted against a person which—

(a) conveys a serious threat;

(b) is humiliating or degrading;

(c) forms part of a campaign of mistreatment.

(13) In subsection (6) “person” is not limited to a real person.

(14) In subsection (7) “animal” is not limited to a real animal.

Commencement Information

I1 S. 62 in force at Royal Assent, see s. 240(4)(h)