Meta launches fresh legal challenge over UK’s Online Safety Act

Meta is pursuing a fresh legal challenge against Ofcom over the Online Safety Act, the latest move against the UK media regulator by US tech companies in what British officials and politicians fear may slow down implementation of the far-reaching law.

This week, Ofcom was served with papers by the Upper Tribunal over an appeal by Meta against so-called ‘categorisation’ under the Act that subjects WhatsApp and Instagram to additional regulatory duties. These include protecting users from fraudulent ads and increased reporting on the handling of illegal content.

Meta argues that so-called Category 1 duties are not designed for private one-to-one and small-group messaging. Roblox and Quora are also challenging Ofcom over the categorisation of their services.

Ofcom is already facing judicial reviews in two other areas from Meta, the parent company of Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram, which were lodged in the High Court this year and have court dates in October, alongside legal challenges from other tech firms.

Officials and politicians are worried that tech companies are trying to slow down implementation of the Act through the courts. The Online Safety Act, which protects children from harmful and pornographic content, is backed by a wide spectrum of the public.

Damian Collins, former junior minister for tech and the digital economy in the previous Conservative government, said: “It’s clearly a deliberate strategy by Meta to frustrate and delay the implementation of the Online Safety Act. It is a form of lawfare to tie up the regulator. The law is clear and it is what parliament wanted.”

He added that big tech companies had “limitless resources” that could be used against the regulator, adding that the government needed to support Ofcom with more funding. “The legislation is what the British people clearly want.”

This week, Lisa Nandy, culture secretary, complained about Ofcom’s enforcement of the Online Safety Act, saying “it has been incredibly slow . . . we want to see Ofcom enforcing the law more robustly and more quickly”.

Oliver Griffiths, Ofcom group director for online safety, on Tuesday told a Lords committee that the regulator was also “underwhelmed” with progress and that it was operating in a “highly litigious environment”.

The law came into force in stages from April 2025 but is not expected to be fully implemented until next year.

Another of Meta’s legal actions is a challenge to the fees and potential fines introduced under the Online Safety Act.

Ofcom’s operating costs for enforcing the rules are funded by tech firms, with fees based on a company’s qualifying worldwide revenue. But Meta argues that this is set at a disproportionate level and not linked to its UK services, which means larger companies bear the majority of Ofcom’s costs.

Meta also objects to using that qualifying worldwide revenue or £18mn, whichever is greater, to decide the fines of up to 10 per cent levied against companies that break the rules. A full hearing is expected in October.

Industry insiders say the fees and fines are consistent with what happens with the UK telecoms industry, arguing that the threat needs to be sufficient for the law to be taken seriously by US tech giants.

Another legal challenge, which is also being fought by TikTok and X, concerns how much information the platforms need to give to the regulator to carry out its job of monitoring their services.

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The UK’s Online Safety Act gives Ofcom powers to demand internal data and documentation from tech companies to ensure they are protecting users and monitoring harmful content. Meta, TikTok and X argue the scale of some of the information requests goes beyond what is permitted under the Act or is necessary and proportionate.

An Ofcom spokesperson said: “Parliament has charged us with the job of regulating an industry that has been unregulated and unaccountable for more than 20 years.”

They added: “Meta, X and TikTok are challenging our efforts to gather information from them. Meta is challenging us on our ability to set fees and maximum fines. Separately, Roblox, WhatsApp, Instagram and Quora are appealing our decisions in July to designate them as category 1 services. On all these fronts, we will robustly defend our reasoning and decisions.”

A Meta spokesperson said: “Like many others in the industry, including TikTok, Roblox, X and Quora, we are challenging specific aspects of implementation.”

They added: “These are not challenges to the law itself, but how Ofcom has interpreted it. This is a normal feature of any new regulatory regime being bedded in and ensures questions of process, scope and implementation get settled so the law is applied proportionately, accurately and consistently.”

TikTok said it had “committed significant resources to ongoing compliance” and its challenge was “on a narrow issue regarding Ofcom’s implementation of a substantial extra-statutory programme not mandated by law”.