September 23, 2026
MANILA – An attached agency of the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) has given two online platforms a deadline in establishing their presence in the country and coordinating with authorities, as the government tries to determine the extent of social media’s influence following a third school shooting in three months.
Meanwhile, Malacañang said it is open to a lawmaker’s proposal requiring congressional franchises for social media platforms to operate in the country.
The DICT’s Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC) on Tuesday said it had sent letters, both dated Sept.21, to Reddit and Discord, requesting their availability to Philippine authorities within 24 hours.
Reddit, a social media company publicly traded in the New York Stock Exchange, serves as an online forum for various communities, built by netizens around their favorite topics.
Discord, run by an American software company of the same name, defines itself as a “group chat that’s all fun and games.”
There has been no word yet from the two platforms as of Sept. 22.
“The CICC warned that failure or refusal to comply with the prescribed period could prompt the agency … to restrict their operations or prohibit access of users to the platforms in the Philippines,” the agency said in a statement.
“We are not asking platforms to police the Internet for the government, but to be reachable, accountable, and responsive when activities on their platforms put Filipino children and communities at risk,” CICC Director Renato Paraiso said in the statement.
Other instructions
“When an online threat spills over into the real world, there has to be clear channel for authorities to act,” he added.
Reddit and Discord were also directed to submit written explanations of policies they have carried out regarding safety standards, rapid response and age verification.
They were ordered as well to provide a framework to address various forms of digital exploitation among minors—in particular, “online sexual abuse and exploitation of children (OSAEC), child sexual abuse or exploitation of materials (CSAEM) and nihilistic violence extremism (NVE).”
The CICC said it is coordinating with the Department of Foreign Affairs in setting a meeting with Meta, Reddit, Discord and other platforms to discuss measures to curb online threats and violence targeting children.
The agency said it was prompted to write Reddit and Discord, following reports of violent online content influencing the teen suspect in the Sept. 18 shooting at Banga National High School in South Cotabato. The 16-year-old suspect killed two other teens before shooting himself.
That incident happened less than two months after the July 24 shooting at Ateneo de Zamboanga, where the suspect also killed himself after shooting another teen.
That tragedy, in turn, followed the June 22 shooting at San Jose National High School in Tacloban City where three students were killed.
Congressional franchises
Also on Tuesday, Palace press officer Claire Castro said a proposal by Quezon Rep. David Suarez requiring social media platforms to secure congressional franchises is now “being discussed [by the government], and that is what the Department of Information and Communications Technology wants as well.”
She said such a measure could give the government greater jurisdiction and authority over social media platforms.
“Definitely, once the President has read the contents of [the] proposed bills and sees that they are good and beneficial to our people, he will not stand in the way to enact the law,” Castro said.
Education Secretary Sonny Angara also agreed it was time for the government to press social media companies to conduct stricter regulations on their platforms.
Angara said several websites and applications have masqueraded as safe platforms for children “but are really being used for recruitment [to] terrorism and nihilistic violence groups.”
But rather than an outright ban on social media among minors, the education chief wants these platforms to be more “child-friendly.”
Angara said he has recommended “specific policy points” to the DICT, adding the agency “can figure it out.”
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