Online anti-bullying proposals 'step in right direction', Countryside Alliance says

An awareness of online bullying directed at people living in the countryside has support
An awareness of online bullying directed at people living in the countryside has support

The government has announced plans to make the UK the “safest place in the world to be online” amid growing awareness raised of online bullying targeting people living in the countryside.

As part of the governments internet safety green paper the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport is demanding that social networks and internet providers remove abusive, humiliating or intimidating content, with an industry-wide levy applied to help raise awareness.

This voluntary levy will see internet companies such as Google and Facebook asked to pay measures to combat and raise awareness about online bullying and other web dangers.

However, if the companies refuse to pay a levy the culture secretary, Karen Bradley, has not ruled out a legislative approach.

The Countryside Alliance (CA) welcome these plans, having long campaigned for the government to keep online abuse on the Parliamentary agenda.

Bullying in the country

The CA says it "strongly condemns" online bullying of any kind.

The organisation said in particular, it has been involved with helping raise awareness to the online bullying that rural communities and pursuers of country sports face on a daily basis.

In March, the Countryside Alliance wrote to Facebook to alert them to particular abusive comments, urging the social media platform to reconsider and update their community standards so to be in accordance with new CPS guidelines published in the autumn.

In addition to this, the CA ran their 'Thunderclap' campaign to focus on raising awareness of online abuse and the bullying of people in the countryside.

This campaign reached approximately 1.2 million people and called on social platforms to take threats seriously and take action by standing up to those who incite hatred and violence.

In a statement, the Countryside Alliance said: "The government’s proposals are definitely a step in the right direction to help stop this growing issue and we will be responding to the consultation, but we would urge all of our members to make sure that they report any online abuse that they come across by using the various social media platforms’ built-in features."