Molly Russell’s father calls for windfall tax on tech firms that do not prioritise children’s safety

The father of Molly Russell has called for a windfall tax to be imposed on tech firms for putting profits before children’s safety.

Ian Russell, whose daughter took her own life after being bombarded by suicide and self-harm posts, proposed the one-off “harm reduction windfall tax” as part of a five-point manifesto that his foundation is urging the political parties to adopt.

In a report published on Monday, the Molly Rose Foundation, set up in his daughter’s memory to campaign for online safety, said the tax would be a legitimate payback for the profits earned through the tech companies’ algorithms which prioritised content to users to generate advertising revenues.

The foundation has not set a level for the windfall tax, but if it were to replicate the Government’s 35 per cent surcharge on energy companies, it would generate a potential £30 billion from Meta’s global profits alone. Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp.

16,000 ‘destructive’ posts

Molly, 14, took her own life after receiving 16,000 “destructive” posts encouraging self-harm, anxiety and even suicide in her final six months including on Instagram, her inquest was told.

The coroner concluded she died from an act of self-harm while suffering from depression and the “negative effects of online content” which had “more than minimally contributed” to her death.

The foundation said the money from the windfall tax would be ploughed into research, advocacy and making tech firms more accountable, which would provide evidence that Ofcom, the regulator, could use to investigate and clamp down on online harms. It would also pay for prevention, education and mental health initiatives.

Mr Russell, the chair of the foundation’s trustees, said: “We owe our children nothing less than decisive action that protects them from entirely preventable online harms and prevents further lost lives. It’s time to make clear the cost of entry to the UK market is children’s safety.

“Six years after Molly’s death, it’s time for a fundamental reset of the relationship between tech companies and children. Political parties should commit to bold measures that can reassure parents real change is on the way.”

New accountancy standards

The five-point manifesto also called for new accountancy standards for social media firms that would require them to report every year in their corporate accounts on their users’ exposure to online harms.

The foundation said it would be similar to incoming requirements on corporate entities to report on their exposure to climate-related risks, agreed and now being implemented by G20 members. It added that the UK should also push for a global standard of reporting through the G7.

A similar proposal was put forward by a group of Meta’s shareholders but was blocked by Mr Zuckerberg, the founder, who holds the majority of voting shares.

The manifesto also called for researchers and civil society to be given a statutory right to access tech firms’ anonymised data in order to understand the relationship between their algorithms and online harms.

Overarching duty of care

A new online safety act would also introduce an overarching duty of care and restrict the use of end-to-end encryption of communications between under-18s who are at risk of sexual grooming.

App stores, which are currently not covered by the online safety act, would be made subject to its strictures ensuring, for example, that children under 18 could not be sold or access apps for adults.

Both the Tories and Labour have publicly backed one measure in the manifesto, which gives bereaved parents through coroners a legal right to access their dead children’s social media accounts.

Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, said Labour would take action to ensure the right were enshrined in law if it won the election. The Tories included the provision in its data protection bill, which was shelved when Rishi Sunak called the snap election.