It is all too easy for children to access graphic suicide and self-harm instructions online, a leading psychiatrist has said.
Dr Bernadka Dubicka, chairwoman of the faculty of child and adolescent psychiatry at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, told a House of Lords committee that tech giants should point users towards help and advice, similar to messages issued by TV broadcasters before and after a programme.
It came as the Government’s long-awaited final proposals for online harms internet regulation were announced on Tuesday.
The measures will force social media sites and apps which host user-generated content to remove or limit the spread of harmful posts such as suicide material – though the Government said it is still working with the Law Commission on whether the promotion of self-harm should be made illegal.
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Did you pick up some bad habits over lockdown? If the answer is yes, then you aren’t the only one. While it may have started out all banana bread baking, Joe Wicks workouts and daily walks around the park, a new study by the Office for National Statistics suggests our healthy habits wore off. According to the research, we were drinking more, moving less and addicted to TV throughout the restrictions.
Social media firms such as Facebook and Instagram could face multi-million pound fines under laws to ban content that encourages suicide and self-harm.
The Government wants to draw up offences banning the spread of such material, which has been implicated in deaths around the world.
Molly Russell, from north-west London, killed herself aged 14 in 2017 after viewing self-harm images on Instagram, leading to her father Ian campaigning for greater protections online.
A Government source told The Sun on Sunday: ‘A child seeing, and worse, being “suggested”, self-harm material is every parent’s nightmare. It’s right we act on this, and make sure tech firms are in no doubt this stuff must not be on their platforms.’
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