Nadine Dorries said executives at Facebook, Twitter, and other platforms would be held criminally liable within "three to six months" of the Online Safety Bill becoming law. At the moment, the proposed legislation offers tech bosses two years to tighten up their defences against trolls, bullies, and predators. But Mrs Dorries yesterday told the Bill's draft committee she wanted to speed up the process of making site controllers accountable for toxic content.

       She said: "It's just a nonsense that platforms have been given two years to make themselves ready for what would be criminal action.

       "So, to the platforms, take note now - it will not be two years. We are looking at truncating that to a much shorter time frame and that's one of the areas as Secretary of State I want to go further in this Bill."

       She added: "They actually have the ability to put right what they're doing wrong now.

       "Why would we give them two years? Remove your harmful algorithms today and you will not be subjecting named individuals to criminal liability and prosecution." Yesterday's discussion echoes the demands of the Daily Express Unmask The Trolls campaign, which aims to rid the web of keyboard assassins.