Today the Government has opened the
application process to appoint members of the
UKCIS Executive Board, offering experienced and
committed organisations or individuals the chance to
help make the UK the safest place in the world to be
online.
Expanding the scope of the UK Council for
Child Internet Safety (UKCCIS), and guided by
the government’s Internet Safety Strategy, UKCIS will
work to improve the online safety of everyone in the
UK, particularly the needs of groups who are often
disproportionately targets of online abuse.
UKCIS will bring together a partnership of more than
200 organisations representing government, regulators,
industry, law enforcement, academia and charities.
, Minister for
Digital and the Creative Industries said:
Only through collaborative action will the UK be the
safest place to be online. By bringing together key
stakeholders, from the tech giants to the third
sector, UKCIS will be the cornerstone of this effort;
driving the development of technical solutions and
equipping UK citizens to tackle online harms.
, Director of
the UK Safer Internet Centre at SWGfL, a charitable
trust that specialises in online safety, said:
To build a safer internet, we need to work across
sectors and disciplines, making sure we learn from
the experiences of a wide variety of citizens. We
welcome the new opportunities provided by the UK
Council for Internet Safety, and look forward to
working closely with the new Council”.
Priority areas of focus will include online harms such
as cyberbullying and sexual exploitation;
radicalisation and extremism; violence against women
and girls; hate crime and hate speech; and forms of
discrimination against groups protected under the
Equality Act, for example on the basis of disability or
race.
The proposal to expand the remit of the UK Council for
Child Internet Safety was outlined in the Government’s
Internet Safety Strategy Green Paper in October 2017.
The new Council will have specific objectives
reflecting children and young people’s special needs
for care and protection, and will build on the
pioneering work of UKCCIS in this area. The Executive
Board will contain representatives of children’s
organisations.
Reflecting a cross-government approach to internet
safety, the UKCIS Executive Board will have three
co-Ministerial chairs from the Department for Digital,
Culture, Media and Sport, Home Office and the
Department for Education. It will also include
representatives from the Devolved Administrations of
Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
The application process opens today and will close at
1pm on 3 September 2018.
