The kind of ratings used for films could be applied to websites in a bid to better police the internet and protect children from harmful and offensive material, Britain's Culture Secretary has said.

Andy Burnham told The Daily Telegraph that the government was planning to negotiate with the administration of US President-elect Barack Obama to draw up new international rules for English language websites.

"The more we seek international solutions to this stuff - the UK and the US working together - the more that an international norm will set an industry norm," the newspaper reports the Culture Secretary as saying in an interview.

Giving websites film-style ratings would be one possibility.

"This is an area that is really now coming into full focus," Mr Burnham told the paper.


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