The furore comes after Preston Byrne, managing partner at U.S.-based tech law firm Byrne & Storm, told POLITICO that “multiple” American websites had instructed him to bring a lawsuit against the U.K’s telecoms regulator Ofcom over free speech concerns.
“We will also be seeking a declaratory judgment from a federal court that confirms, in writing, the indisputably correct legal position that the Online Safety Act is null and void in the United States. With any luck, this should clear up the question for the hundreds of thousands of American companies that Ofcom hasn’t targeted yet, but planned to target until our clients bravely stood in their way,” he added.
Byrne said he’d been providing staffers on the House Judiciary Committee “with all the relevant Ofcom documents that cross [his] desk.” But he clarified the communication was “largely one-way” and that he and Jim Jordan weren’t directly working together.
An Ofcom spokesperson said Friday: “The new rules require tech firms to tackle criminal content and prevent children from seeing defined types of material that’s harmful to them. There is no requirement on them to restrict legal content for adult users. In fact, they must carefully consider how they protect users’ rights to freedom of expression while keeping people safe.”