Whenever then-HBO Max made the decision to dump and bunch of its original programming last year as a way to cut costs over Warner Bros. Discovery merger, it bizarrely kicked off a sub-trend of streaming services snipping away at their original content collections, with Disney+ recently revealing its own batch of cutting-block shows. Netflix pulled a similar kind of move in removing some early offerings like Hemlock Grove, and it looks like some customers may be losing access to a selection of TV shows and movies, as the company’s execs appear to be taking issue with a new Media Bill from the UK government pushing for stricter streaming regulations.
British TV standards have always stood apart from those in the U.S. and certain other parts of the world, with the current media regulator Ofcom keeping a metaphorical eye on content being produced for broadcast networks. Members of the UK government are pushing for Ofcom to extend its boundaries to incorporate the broadening world of streaming content, which would put everything currently available on Netflix (and other services) under the watchdog’s microscope. Which in turn would put the streaming provider at risk of having to pay fines of up to $310,000 for harmful and subjective content, as it were.
In response to the push for online content to fall under Ofcom’s purview, Netflix execs warn that a number of TV shows and movies could be preemptively taken off the service in the UK, according to Deadline, to make sure it falls within the regulatory lines. As far as what Ofcom could consider harmful for viewers, and what it conversely considers impartial, that could create quite a bit of stress and confusion. And to that effect, Netflix released a statement calling out how difficult it would be to maintain enforcement over such content restrictions on a constant basis. Here’s what the streaming giant had to say:
The range and variety of Netflix’s content, generally considered a strength of our offering in terms of maximizing choice for British viewers, could equally become a potential source of risk from a compliance perspective if it fell within Ofcom’s remit. Without considerably greater clarity around the scope and application of these provisions, it would inevitably be easier to remove content pre-emptively from our UK catalog than risk an onerous compliance burden and potential liability.
Of course, without a more specific set of rules in place at the moment, it’s hard to say exactly what kinds of content would be restricted. But it’s easy to predict that some of Netflix’s sexually explicit content could be up for removal, from the almost too-real sex scenes in the 365 Days films to the show Sex/Life. As well, given the lean-in on impartiality, one could predict that Ofcom will take issue with some of the content geared towards British royalty, whether it’s the review-bombed Harry and Meghan documentary or other content from the former royals.
Netflix recently started cracking down on password-sharing after months and months of building up to it. So while it might have been doable in the past for UK viewers to view any purged content by using a U.S. buddy’s account, that probably won’t be so easy to pull off now that there are better detection techniques.
While waiting to see how things shape out between the UK government and streaming companies, everyone with Netflix subscriptions should check out everything new and coming soon to the service.
