A best-selling author and gender equality campaigner has urged Jersey’s government to go beyond the limitations of the UK’s Online Safety Act and “aim higher” in holding tech companies accountable.
Laura Bates is the author of 10 books, and the founder of the Everyday Sexism Project which has catalogued over 200,000 testimonies of gender inequality.
Her work has informed government debates, school curricula, and corporate diversity training, and she has advised institutions like the UN and the British Transport Police.
She visited Jersey College for Girls this week to discuss how sexual harassment and abuse among young people is often tech-facilitated through social media, filters, deepfake videos, and online pornography.
Whilst in Jersey, Ms Bates praised the island’s decision not to adopt the UK’s Online Safety Act and instead develop its own version of the law – and urged local politicians to go further than just tackling harmful content after it has already done damage.
Speaking to an audience of local teachers, parents and politicians last night, she said: “I think that you’re in a position where perhaps you could be really innovative around regulation of emerging technologies.
“Particularly AI, and the ways in which it is unintentionally perpetuating existing forms of bias, because there isn’t regulation at the point of usage at the moment.
“There’s a lot of really exciting ways that could go.”
Ms Bates explained that the the UK’s Online Safety Act “focuses too much in its implementation on the idea of asking platforms to take content down after the fact when harm has already been done”.
“It also assumes that they will comply when that hasn’t been the case at any point before,” she added.
The activist said that Jersey’s legislation has the opportunity to “go further than just assuming tech companies will comply with removing content after the harm has already been done”.
“It has to aim higher than that,” said Ms Bates.
“We have to think about prevention.
“We have to think about algorithms and transparency.
“We have to think about consequences for perpetrators that go further than an overburdened legal system that already fails women and girls.
“We need to make sure that there is actual follow through when non-compliance happens, because that’s what we’ve seen over and over again with social media.
“How is that going to change this time around?”
Instead of focusing solely on content takedowns, Ms Bates said Jersey could help set a new standard by demanding transparency from platforms about how their algorithms operate – and requiring them to reduce the spread of harmful, extreme content.
She explained: “I’d like to see more innovative measures taken around getting platforms to change the way in which their algorithm works – so that rather than being obsessed with forcing people to watch for longer and longer and therefore prioritising increasingly extreme content, the algorithm is more transparent and shown to focus on prioritising high quality or relevant content instead.”
Ms Bates also called for more support and funding from government for frontline services who support those who experience sexual violence and harm – both on and offline.