Copenhagen, Nov 5 (IANS): The Danish government plans to explore the possibility of regulating social media companies and making them more directly accountable for the content they carry, said Minister of Justice Nick Hekkerup in a written reply to parliament's Committee on Justice on Tuesday.

"The issue of social media's responsibility for the content is a complex issue and there is a need for us to consider whether the tools that exist today are working properly," said the minister, reports Xinhua news agency.

Several parties from the so-called "red bloc" supporting the ruling Social Democrats in parliament, already announced in October that they were ready to legislate on social media sites, such as Facebook, Instagram or YouTube, to make them directly responsible for removing illegal content.

"We have reached the point where we have to recognize that social media has a responsibility. I have noticed that other countries have found a solution, and so we can in Denmark, too," Karina Lorentzen of the Socialist People's Party told the Danish newspaper BT.

In Germany, obviously illegal content must be removed from social media on pain of a fine within 24 hours of being discovered or reported.

Lorentzen said she supported the introduction of a similar system in Denmark. However, Hekkerup wrote in his reply that he would not at this stage specifically address whether Denmark should follow the German model.