Link to US-based site, whose operators were fined £950,000 by Ofcom, appears in Google’s search results and can be accessed in UK
Google has denied breaching the Online Safety Act by promoting a “nihilistic” suicide forum associated with 164 deaths in the UK where it is supposed to be banned.
The UK’s internet regulator fined the forum’s US-based operator £950,000 because the site, which “presents a material risk of significant harm”, can still be accessed in the UK despite British laws criminalising encouraging or assisting suicide.
However, a link to the website still appears in Google’s search results allowing users with basic software to circumvent the block and access screeds of advice on suicide methods.
Google’s promotion of the site, not named by the Guardian, was raised by the Molly Rose Foundation, an online safety campaign, whose chief executive, Andy Burrows, told Radio 4’s Today programme: “If you search for it by name it will still come up in search results – a clear-cut breach of the act, but on that matter Ofcom has so far declined to take action.”
