Ofcom Chair Ian Cheshire says he is overseeing a “wide-ranging” review aimed at refitting the regulator to new duties overseeing Big Tech and enforcing the OSA
Ian Cheshire tells FT that watchdog will need ‘more resources’ to enforce online safety rules as it takes on wider brief
Context & Ripple Effects
Ofcom’s remit has been moving from an intended expansion into online-content oversight to active enforcement: it built a dedicated online-safety team in 2024 and began enforcing the Online Safety Act in 2025. Cheshire’s review is therefore about whether the regulator’s organisation and capacity match that operational phase.
The recent outcome in which X agreed to stronger UK protections after an Ofcom probe shows the regulator’s powers are already producing company-level responses. The request for more resources puts the durability and breadth of that enforcement model at issue.
First-order effects
- Ofcom will assess how to reorganise and resource itself for its wider technology and online-safety brief; Cheshire has explicitly identified a need for greater enforcement capacity.
- Big Tech platforms operating in the UK face a regulator seeking to strengthen its ability to oversee compliance, following X’s commitment to faster review of illegal hate and terror content.
Second-order effects
- A better-resourced Ofcom could make sustained compliance operations—not just responses to individual investigations—a more central requirement for platforms subject to UK rules.
- The review may increase competition for regulatory, policy and trust-and-safety expertise, building on Ofcom’s earlier specialist online-safety hiring.
Third-order effects
- If additional capacity follows, UK platform governance could become more institutionalised: a legacy communications regulator would operate as a standing digital-market overseer rather than a body adding isolated online duties.
- The key uncertainty is whether resources and organisational changes keep pace with the expanding remit; that balance will shape how consistently online-safety obligations are enforced across large platforms.
The trend: This is part of the shift from writing platform-safety rules to building permanent regulatory capacity to enforce them against major technology companies.