The Government is rolling out a secretive AI system to trawl social media for “concerning” posts, so it can take what is described as “action”.
The AI platform, which is being deployed by the Whitehall-based Counter Disinformation Unit (CDU), now rebranded as the National Security Online Information Team (NSOIT), has ties to intelligence agencies and has long operated beyond public scrutiny.
The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), which has oversight of the platform, insists the tool will focus only on content “which poses a threat to national security or public safety risk” — but we know from past experience that government efforts in this space have a habit of mission creep.
More troubling still, this language mirrors a proposal from an emergency meeting convened by the pro-censorship Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) after the Southport riots. That meeting — attended by DSIT, the Home Office, Ofcom, and the Counter-Terrorism Internet Referral Unit — discussed ways to expand state control over online speech.
One of the most striking proposals to emerge was amending the Online Safety Act to give Ofcom expanded “emergency response” powers to combat “misinformation” deemed a threat to “national security” or “the health or safety of the public”.
Now, NSOIT is achieving the same goal — without the need for Parliament. Instead of going through the hassle of a legislative amendment, with all the scrutiny that entails, this shadowy, non-statutory agency is simply expanding its own remit behind closed doors.