Comment by aimazon
7 months ago
Don't run a website personally, set up a separate legal entity. The UK is one of the easiest places in the world to do this and has well-understood legal entities that fit the model of a community-operated organisation (i.e: "community interest company"). The fact that the OP is running such a large community as an individual is bonkers in the first place, independent of this new act.
Personally, I think it's bonkers that an individual can't run an online forum.
Personally, I think it's bonkers that you think "I don't have time to comply with the law so I shouldn't have to" is a reasonable position.
People who think this law is reasonable are bonkers.
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I agree but that ship sailed a decade ago. There's no additional risk with the new bill, it's more of the same. If there are concerns about liability because of this new bill then there should be concerns about liability already.
I sympathise with the OP because at some point everyone becomes too old to deal with the headaches of running a community. I have no opposition to their choice to shut down the forum. I just don't believe liability as a result of the new bill is the reason.
> I just don't believe liability as a result of the new bill is the reason.
It seems like OP is commenting on this thread; you can accuse them of lying directly, if you'd like.
but there is additional risk and liability, because the new act creates more work in order to be compliant (which is what increases the liability), and it increases the risk of being attacked.
there's never been an instance of any of the proclaimed things that this act protects [...] people from, so he should be safe, right?
but despite this, he is already being attacked, and those attacks will not just continue but they are likely to increase because the attack surface has become larger.
It raises the cost and hassle involved from "I need a cheap hosting package" to I need to do paperwork, keep and file accounts, etc.
Are you claiming that setting up a CIC removes individual liability for wrongdoing? So, I set up a CIC for running forums, with $0 of assets and negligible running costs, then in the event of a fine I'm scot free?
Yes. A CIC is just a limited company with some additional community interest obligations. You can set up a limited company to shield yourself from liability (i.e: if your website is sued by a user, your personal assets aren't at risk) and only in exceptional cases (where serious lawbreaking is involved) could you be held personally liable.
Rightly or wrongly, limited companies in the UK provide a high degree of protection for wrongdoing. Defrauding HMRC out of hundreds of thousands of pounds and suffering no consequence is happening day in day out. An Ofcom fine is nothing by comparison.
1. Thanks for this very helpful information about how some seemingly quite simple legal manoeuvring can be used to dodge 99% of this law.
2. Doesn't the fact that simple legal manoeuvring can be used to dodge 99% of this law make the law (and laws like it) farcical on its face? Merely an elaborate set of extra hoops that only serves to punish the naive, while increasing everyone's compliance costs?
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How would that work if someone set up a CIC, used it to rent a VPS and did some grey-hat hacking activities?
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Assuming you regard the cost of keeping and filing accounts and other paperwork, annual registration fees, etc. as negligible yes.
Keeping accounts: cost, depends on if you make any money. If you do then you would have to keep accounts even if not a CIC!
Filing accounts: £15. An online form will ask you for your balance sheet summary only unless you are very large.
One off registration:£65
Annual confirmation statement:£34
So depends on your perspective I suppose.
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