Only one third of those surveyed knew about the bill

A survey commissioned by Verité Research has revealed that 56% of those who are aware of the Online Safety Bill believe that it will curtail the freedom of using social media.To the question ‘the government introduced a bill to parliament on regulating behavior on social media, do you know about it?’, one-third (34%) of respondents said ‘yes’.

Of those who said ‘yes’, 56% said it would ‘reduce the freedom of using social media’, 25% said ‘it will not make much of a difference’ and 19% said ‘it will reduce the misuse of social media’.

The Online Safety Bill, published in the government gazette on 18 September and tabled in parliament on 3 October, aims to establish an Online Safety Commission with defined powers and functions.

 The Supreme Court has determined that 31 clauses in the bill should be amended for it to be passed with a simple majority. In its current state, a special majority of two-thirds is required for its passage.

The poll was based on an island-wide, nationally representative sample of responses from 1,029 Sri Lankan adults, conducted in October 2023. The poll has a maximum error margin below ±3% at a 95% confidence interval.

 This was a part of the Syndicated Surveys instrument by Verité Research and the polling partner was Vanguard Survey (Pvt) Ltd. Verité Research also provides other organisations with the opportunity to survey the sentiments of the people of Sri Lanka through this poll.