Today the @HLDemoDigital report is published entitled 'Digital Technology and the Resurrection of Trust'. This major new report takes a broad look at the impact of digital tech on democracy and provides an important vision for where we need to go (1/13)
https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld5801/ldselect/lddemdigi/77/7702.htm

2/13 The report focuses on 6 key themes: 'Informed Citizens, Accountability, Transparency, Inclusive Debate, Free and Fair Elections and Active Digital Citizens'. It makes 45 recommendations, recognising that it's "down to lawmakers to protect democracy in an age of surveillance"

3/13 One of my favourite paragraphs spotlights the need to think about and protect democratic ideals:

4/13 The recommendations are wide ranging & include important proposals such as developing a code of practice for political advertising, extending platforms' duty of care to prevent generic harm to democracy & establishing an independent ombudsman for content moderation decisions

5/13 The report also focused on regulatory capacity, and calls for an urgent review to determine regulators' levels of digital expertise. Ensuring regulators have necessary skills was a key finding from a @turinginst @CrickCentre @po_qu workshop I ran as part of the inquiry

6/13 For academics, there are recommendations on data sharing, with calls for platforms to provide researchers access to APIs, 'clean rooms' for data analysis and to facilitate more public interest research (thanks @RebekahKTromble & @claesdevreese for your work on this!)

7/13 There are also calls for algorithmic transparency, with recommendations for OfCom to be given new powers to audit algorithmic recommending systems. There are also calls for Parliament to develop greater digital capacity ( @estrangeirada!)

8/13 On elections, @sampower and @MichelaPalese will be pleased to see calls for modernisation of electoral law, and many long standing recommendations around imprints and fines endorsed

9/13 There are also vital new calls for digital literacy initiatives, starting with a review of existing evidence around what works, and a call for Ofcom to require platforms to test major design changes to ensure they increase user choices.

10/13 This is a wide ranging report and would not have been possible with the amazing Parliamentary staff Olivia Crabtree, Tim Stacey and Rob Cocks who worked tirelessly to collate evidence and compile the report. Working as part of this team has been a joy

11/13 It was also built on fantastic academic evidence from, amongst others, the brilliant @jennifercobbe @Elinor_Carmi @rasmus_kleis @RebekahKTromble @kreissdaniel @Smith1966G @la_temple @AnaInesLanger @prof_vaccari @rv_southern @shephard_mark @patyrossini @alanjrenwick

12/13 @lmneudert @HelenMargetts @estrangeirada @TristanHotham @ysabelgerrard @gillianbolsover Thank you all (and the many many others who gave evidence)!!

13/13 It's been such a pleasure to work as Special Advisor for the Committee, I just hope the Government recognises the value of this report and starts to implement some much needed change!