The UK government has proposed new plans requiring tech platforms to remove non-consensual intimate images within 48 hours, or risk fines and potential blocking.

Under the plans, victims would only have to report the image once to ensure its removal across multiple platforms, rather than having to contact each platform individually. 

Once flagged, tech firms will not only be legally required to remove the content within 48 hours but to ensure it’s automatically blocked at every future upload. Failure to do so could result in fines of up to 10% of the platform’s qualifying worldwide revenue or having its services blocked in the UK.

The government said that intimate image abuse should be treated with the same severity as child sexual abuse and terrorism content.

The new law is being made through an amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill, which is making its way through the House of Lords.

To ensure compliance, the government is set to publish guidance for internet providers outlining how they should block access to sites hosting this content. This will help target rogue websites that may fall outside the reach of the Online Safety Act.

Prime minister Keir Starmer said he would “leave no stone unturned in the fight to protect women from violence and abuse”. 

Technology secretary Liz Kendall said: “No woman should have to chase platform after platform, waiting days for an image to come down. Under this government, you report once and you’re protected everywhere.”

Janaya Walker, interim director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition, said the plan “rightly places the responsibility on tech companies to act”.

These new plans expand on the government’s wider strategy to halve violence against women and girls over the next decade. As part of this strategy, in December 2025 the government announced it would ban ‘nudification’ apps, which use generative AI to turn images of real people into deepfake nude pictures and videos without their consent. 

These new offences, which build on existing rules that criminalise the sharing of non-consensual sexually explicit deepfakes, would make it impossible for children in the UK to take, share or view a nude image using their phones. 

Last month, the government announced plans to collaborate with tech firms, including Microsoft, to develop tools to combat the unprecedented growth of harmful AI-generated deepfake content.