The UK government is considering fresh steps to stop misinformation spreading on social media during public emergencies, Technology Secretary Liz Kendall has said.
Her comments came after disorder broke out in Southampton following the police response to the fatal stabbing of Henry Nowak. Elon Musk has repeatedly posted about the case on X, the social media platform he owns.
Kendall said she was “very concerned” about the role of online platforms during periods of unrest, especially when false or inflammatory claims can spread quickly and put public safety at risk.
Speaking about the issue, she said ministers must look again at what more can be done when misinformation circulates during moments of crisis. She said this could include stronger action to promote trusted sources of information and new ways for users to take back control of what they see online.
One idea being examined is whether people should be able to reset their social media algorithms more easily. Kendall said many users feel harmful or misleading content is pushed towards them, even when they do not want it.
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The discussion follows a report last year by the Commons science, innovation and technology committee, which urged Ofcom to create “crisis response protocols” for social media companies. These would be designed to make platforms act faster when misinformation spreads during serious public disorder.
Ofcom has already consulted on the issue, with more details expected later this month.
The committee began looking into the matter after the riots in the summer of 2024, when misinformation spread online after the murder of three girls at a dance class in Southport. Its report found that misleading and hateful messages were able to spread rapidly, helped by recommendation systems used by social media companies.
Chi Onwurah, who chairs the committee, said the government must do more to tackle the problem. She said the Online Safety Act was not strong enough and had too many gaps.
She added that most of the committee’s proposals for improvement had been rejected, despite Kendall later describing the report as “excellent”. Onwurah said that, a year after the report was published, no real progress had been made to update the law.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer also criticised Musk this week, accusing him of “interfering in our politics”.
Kendall said she understood why some politicians no longer wanted to use X, but said she would not be “bullied off” the platform.
She said she wanted to use social media to put the government’s message before both supporters and critics, adding that the government stood for “hope and not hate”.
Musk has used his large X following to draw attention to the Nowak case. One of his posts shared comments from the far-right MP Rupert Lowe and included the word “RAGE”. It was viewed more than 25 million times.
By comparison, Kendall’s latest post on X, about a visit to Liverpool University to promote taxpayer support for innovation, was viewed about 5,500 times and shared eight times.
The debate has also widened after Labour MP Jess Asato began legal action against Musk’s xAI company. She is taking action over demeaning sexualised material created by the Grok AI tool, which later spread on X.
Starmer backed Asato’s decision, saying she was “absolutely right” to take action.
Human rights group Amnesty International said in an analysis last year that X’s algorithms helped drive what it called a major amplification of hate after the Southport murders.
The Commons committee also warned that the Online Safety Act, which was not fully in force during the 2024 riots, lacked proper measures to deal with misinformation during fast-moving crises.
Kendall said the long delay between the first discussions about the Online Safety Act and its implementation showed the system was too slow. She said technology was developing quickly and that Parliament needed to find a faster way to respond.
She compared the issue with the annual finance bill, saying it should not be impossible for MPs to update digital rules more regularly when public safety is at stake.
