Deceased Child User Duties

Yesterday, myself and six other bereaved parents from ‘The Bereaved Families for Online Safety’ Group met with Ofcom and Presidio Safeguarding as part of their ‘Lived Experience group meeting’ to discuss Deceased Child User duties.

The UK's Data (Use and Access) Bill, which became law on June 19, 2025, includes provisions for parents or guardians to access a deceased child's online data. Specifically, a parent or guardian can request data from the preceding 12 months before the child's death from internet service providers (ISPs) without a court order, upon verifying their identity and relationship to the child. Ofcom wanted our ‘lived experience’ feedback on how to help design these duties to help a parent when a child has died.  Well, let me explain, when Jools died, I was physically crawling on my hands and knees up the stairs. I could barely get out of bed, and some days I didn’t. I couldn’t eat, and I felt physically sick constantly. I sat on a step, breathing into a paper bag while having a panic attack.  I didn’t really care about breathing myself, so to think that a parent is going to be in any fit state to ask to obtain data, preserve data or indeed do much at all is out of the question for most bereaved parents. You are existing, nothing else and barely doing that.

I go back to my argument for Jools’ Law, which all the other bereaved parents in the room yesterday agreed with. THIS HAS TO BE THE POLICE who ask the coroner to preserve and request the data URGENTLY.  Whilst I was under the impression until now that there are 90 days to protect the data being removed from the phone, I have been corrected, “coins”, which is data stored on the phone, go after only 28 days. So unless the POLICE & THE CORONER preserve and request this data it could well me missing by the time the police POSSIBLY look at the device.  Well, I don’t really remember the first couple of months after Jools died.  In between uncontrollable sobbing, crawling to the bathroom, and then being asked things like “what kind of coffin do you want for your child?”, there is no way I would have been able to ask the police to obtain this data.  I have shown that I’m a fighter, well, it took me 2 years to find my fight in me again, how on earth would a parent do this in the first 28 days? We need Jools’ Law, and it needs to be compulsory that on the death of a child, this data is automatically preserved and requested BY THE POLICE, informing the Coroner, and then the Coroner instructing Ofcom. 

Even today I have been contacted by a parent whose child died 5 months ago to say, “We are five months on from xxxxx’s death and we have requested that the Coroner preserve her phone data and requested for it to be analysed. So far they have refused. We discovered lots of harmful content on xxxx’s tiktok account, which we informed the Police and Coroner of, but we have had no response. The police have had xxxx’s phone since she died in January and they were able to access it, but I believe they have done the most basic of checks. It's all very disappointing”.

When is this going to change? It is so very wrong.

And there is another problem.  I was told that once the Data Use and Access Bill had Royal Accent, it was law and Coroners could use it.  Ofcom told me yesterday that this is NOT correct. 

There are various sections of the Bill, which I asked for clarification on from Ofcom:

The first stage would be to preserve the data so that Social Media companies don’t delete it – Section 124 of the bill.  HOWEVER, this part can’t be used yet, even though the law has had Royal Assent.

WHY? – It must go through a consultation process before it can be used.

1. Drafting the Code(s) of Practice and Establishing a Panel

• Under new Section 124B, the Information Commissioner must:

• Draft a statutory code of practice outlining how access requests should work.

• Establish a stakeholder panel that includes experts, affected individuals (e.g., parents), industry representatives, regulators, etc.

• Publish the draft code, panel membership, selection process, and reasons for inclusion before panel review.

🗣️ 2. Panel Review & Public Consultation

• The panel meets to review the draft code and submits a report with recommendations.

• The Commissioner must then:

• Publish the revised code and panel report (or a summary).

• Explain why any panel recommendations were not adopted.

• Meanwhile, a public consultation typically takes place to gather views from civil society, tech companies, researchers, bereaved families, etc.

• The Bill itself requires a “thorough consultation” before enforcing regulations.

📊 3. Impact Assessment

• Under Section 124C, an impact assessment must be carried out and published:

• Identifying who would be affected by the code.

• Evaluating potential impacts on those groups.

📜 4. Formal Regulatory Process

• After consultation and panel review, the Commissioner—and ultimately the Secretary of State—may put the code into effect through formal regulation.

• The Secretary of State has the power to:

• Modify or suspend certain panel requirements via regulation (negative resolution procedure).

• Any resulting regulations (e.g. verification methods, extra safeguards for third-party data) must undergo affirmative approval in Parliament.

⏱️ 5. Timeline & Government Commitments

• The Government has committed to:

• Waiting for Ofcom’s report (on researchers’ access under the Online Safety Act), due July 2025.

• Launching a public consultation shortly after publication.

• Ensuring adequate time is allocated for stakeholder input before finalising regulations.

• Waiting for Ofcom’s report (on researchers’ access under the Online Safety Act), due July 2025.

• Launching a public consultation shortly after publication.

• Ensuring adequate time is allocated for stakeholder input before finalising regulations.

✅ Summary Flow Chart

Step	Action
1.	Commissioner drafts code + forms stakeholder panel
2.	Publish draft code, panel details, panel reviews and issues report
3.	Public consultation gathers views from all stakeholders
4.	Impact assessment published
5.	Final code and any modifications are published
6.	Regulations laid before Parliament for approval
7.	Section 124 comes into force once regulations gain parliamentary approval

Ofcom confirmed that Section 101 of the Data Use and Access Bill amends the Online Safety Act 2023, specifically empowering Ofcom to support child death investigations by coroners or procurators fiscals. This apparently IS in force. This allows Coroners to request social media data for a deceased child, but apparently not preserve it, as section 124 can’t be used yet.  

I repeat, please please please can police have the power on the death of a child to automatically request immediately to preserve and request the children’s online data.  Just get the data.  If it’s not needed, then it’s not needed, just as Jools’ toxicology report was negative and not needed, at least it was done.