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Online Safety Bill       I am writing to you as my MP, to ask you to oppose powers in the Government’s Online Safety Bill that threaten freedom of expression in the UK. I would like to ask that you raise my concerns about the impact that the legislation will have on civil liberties when the Bill returns to Parliament. Defend human rights, not terms and conditions The Online Safety Bill will force Big Tech companies to conduct mass surveillance of their platforms and police Brits’ online speech. The Government’s latest proposals will mean giving state-sponsorship to tech companies’ content policies and terms and conditions — which are already bad for privacy and far more restrictive of free speech than UK laws. These are the same speech codes that have seen Facebook take down the posts of women for saying “men are idiots” under the site’s hate speech policy and YouTube censor a video of Conservative MP David Davis discussing the Government’s vaccine passport policy for allegedly contravening the platform’s “medical misinformation” rules. The Government’s latest plans would mean these Silicon Valley speech standards, not British free speech norms, would set the standards of acceptable discourse online. This means we would be even more closely monitored online, and controversial, unpopular or marginalised voices will be at greater risk of censorship — with state backing. Far from reining in tech companies, this Bill will reinforce their power over public discourse. At the risk of incurring huge fines for deviating from their policies, the Bill will compel companies to err on the side of caution and censor zealously. This will have a serious chilling effect on freedom of expression online. There should be no state sponsorship of tech companies' censorious Ts & Cs. Protect private conversations online Also included in the Bill are plans to force companies to scan our private conversations online. This would mean undermining encryption which protects our private chats on secure messaging services. This is a direct attack on our right to have a private conversation. Private communications and anonymity online are vital for our safety and privacy – and are critical to protect journalists, human rights activists and whistleblowers all around the world. Moves to erode privacy online would set a terrible example for more authoritarian regimes to follow. If the Online Safety Bill compromises anonymity and privacy, these groups will be put at serious risk and we will all be less safe. The Bill must not compel online intermediaries to scan our private messages. I look forward to hearing from you. Kind regards,

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