OSTIA gives an alternative to ‘we can’t do that’
Almost a week after a fantastic launch of the forward thinking online safety organisation, OSTIA, we are even more excited and proud to be part of a group of companies that are working tirelessly to help the UK lead real innovation in online safety.
Following the lead of Edinburgh based Cyan Forensics and PUBLIC, all 14 tech companies in the association are well placed and determined to make an impact in their respective fields, and stand by the three key aims of OSTIA:
- Provide a voice of hope by informing policy makers, technology providers and the general public about online safety technologies
- Create collective influence on policy, regulation and broader support for the sector
- Provide a forum for companies contributing towards the goal of online safety
Backed by government, charities, and key organisatons like the IWF and NSPCC, OSTIA is on the road to stopping the online safety debate from being dominated by “what cannot be done, what is technically impossible, and the conflict with other rights such as privacy and freedom of speech”[1] by bringing together the companies who have built the technology that will solve these problems.
Coming in the midst of what may become a major online safety crisis, OSTIA’s launch and initial goal of compiling an “Introductory Guide to Online Safety… drafted with specialist insight from government and civil society organisations… act[ing] as a guide for online platforms to proactively tackle online safety”[2] is much needed, and in our opinion, long overdue.
DagonflAI has been developing our innovative solution for online child protection and image recognition since 2018, and we are a young company in this association, showing how long the issue of online safety has been largely unanswered. DragonflAI’s focus is to provide companies and social platforms a way to prevent nudity and indecent content from being uploaded and shared through their sites, which we believe can help limit the massive problem of child abuse content that is hosted online. Our technology works by analysing images on the device using AI, rather than promoting a reliance on external moderation infastructure and third party viewing.
We are trying to fulfil the mission of OSTIA by offering a proactive and viable solution to online child abuse that is cheaper and more efficient than human moderation, and along with the other companies in the association, we want to stop large tech companies from making excuses to why they don’t prioritise safety, especially children’s.
Caroline Dineage, the Minister of State for Digital and Culture in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport sumarised the Online Safety Tech Industry Association saying, “this new association will help bring together relevant organisations to collaborate, innovate and create a safer online world,” and we couldn’t have said it better. While we at DragonflAI are determined to bring our software to as many companies as possible who are interested in protecting children online, we are also certain that working alongside the other companies in OSTIA will not only generate impressive technology innovations for digital spaces, but bring notice to the need for the OSTIA’s work, and lead to regulatory changes and discussions about the best ways to bring safety online.
[2] https://ostia.org.uk/2020/04/27/online-safety-tech-industry-association-ostia-launches-at-leeds-digital-festival/
