The United Kingdom Online Safety Act 2023 (OSA) is enforced by Ofcom. It places a duty of care on in-scope online services to reduce illegal content and protect users — especially children — from harmful material.

This article explains the main OSA rules in plain language. If you host a site on mymember.site, you can be confident that we meet these regulatory requirements on your behalf — the assessments, record-keeping, and platform-level safety controls described below are maintained by us as the platform operator.​
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OSA primarily regulates two kinds of service:

Services that display pornographic content to people in the UK also face additional age-verification duties (Part 5) — separate from, but alongside, Part 3 obligations.
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Regulated platforms must complete written safety assessments and keep records on file. The three assessments most often referenced in audits and due-diligence questionnaires are:

What it is: An assessment of the risk that users could encounter illegal content — for example terrorism material, child sexual exploitation material (CSE), hate speech, fraud, or other crimes — and whether the service could be used to commit or facilitate those crimes.

When it was due: Existing platforms were expected to complete their first ICRA by March 16, 2025. New services, or existing services after a major change, must complete one within three months of launch or the change.

What gets documented: Evidence reviewed, residual risk levels (high / medium / low / negligible), and mitigation steps aligned with Ofcom guidance and Codes of Practice.

mymember.site has completed this assessment and maintains written records as required.

What it is: Every regulated service must assess whether children are likely to access the platform.

The test: Unless a service uses highly effective age assurance and access controls that keep minors out entirely, the provider must evaluate whether a significant number of children use the service or whether the platform is likely to attract them.

If children are likely to access: A further assessment is required (see CRA below).

mymember.site has completed the Children's Access Assessment and deployed the age-assurance and content controls it requires.

When it is required: If the CAA concludes that children are likely to access the service.

What it covers: Risks of children encountering harmful content or contact — including priority harms such as suicide and self-harm material, bullying, and other content harmful to children — and the protections deployed to mitigate those risks.

Where required, mymember.site has completed the Children's Risk Assessment and keeps it on file with other OSA records. ​
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Ofcom categorises only the largest services for additional duties on top of core Part 3 obligations. Thresholds are set in UK regulations (2025) using UK monthly active users and service features such as content recommendation, sharing, or direct messaging.

In broad terms:

Fan-subscription and creator-hosting platforms like mymember.site are typically uncategorised — not Category 1 platforms like the largest social networks — but remain fully in scope for illegal-content and child-safety duties. We comply with all core duties that apply to our tier. ​
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Under sections 23 and 34 of the OSA, providers must keep a written record of their assessments, including:

Who sees the records?

Partners, payment processors, or auditors may also request summaries or redacted copies during due diligence.

mymember.site maintains these written records and provides them when lawfully required or during partner due diligence.​
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Separate from Part 3, services that make pornographic content available to users in the United Kingdom must use highly effective age assurance before that content is shown — for example biometric age estimation or approved document-based checks.

Enforcement of Part 5 operator duties began in January 2025. On mymember.site this is handled at the platform level — UK visitors are age-verified before they can access adult content on any creator site. You do not need to build or configure age verification yourself.

👉 United Kingdom age verification requirements for adult sites​
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When you host on mymember.site, the regulatory work described in this article is already taken care of. We maintain the required assessments, records, and platform-level controls — including UK age verification and UK-specific content rules where the law requires them.

To stay aligned with our compliance framework, creators simply follow the same policies and verification steps we already require as part of onboarding:

You do NOT need to conduct your own ICRA, CAA, or CRA, implement UK age verification, or file records with Ofcom. That is all handled by mymember.site. ​