For days, similar scenes have been unfolding across England and parts of Northern Ireland: unrest, fear among the population, a huge police presence, and the fire being fanned further via social media.

For days, BBC News journalists have been contacting major technology companies to find out what they are doing about it.

Whatever it is, they don’t want to talk about it – the messaging app Telegram is the only company that has made an official statement.

It is to be hoped that the The tide has turned on the street. But if the tech companies were hoping to avoid further scrutiny by remaining silent, they may be wrong.

“I find it appalling that they are not taking more responsibility for what is happening,” says Baroness Martha Lane Fox, a leading figure in the British tech scene.

She knows the big technology companies from the inside, as she herself sat on the board of Twitter, as the company was called at the time.

“In general, they don’t like to get involved in politics – it doesn’t do them any good,” she told the BBC.

Given that the UK is a relatively small market on a global scale, she said she was “not surprised” by the silence, but said it should not deter the government from taking action.

“The lack of accountability and serious regulation in this context should worry us all,” she says.

Very little.

Meta – the company behind Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp – has not commented at all. TikTok, Snapchat and the messaging app Signal also remained silent.

A well-informed source at Snapchat told BBC News that the company remains in close contact with regulator Ofcom and the British government.

Meanwhile, Telegram was in the news after a list allegedly containing the names and addresses of immigration lawyers was circulated online after it appeared on the messaging app. The Law Society of England and Wales said it viewed the list as a “very credible threat” to its members.

Telegram did not comment specifically on the list, but told the BBC that its moderators are “actively monitoring the situation and removing channels and posts that contain calls for violence.”

Calls for violence are expressly prohibited in the terms of use of the messaging platforms, it said.

And then there is X.

X, formerly Twitter, did not respond to our requests for comment.

There were false claims, hatred and conspiracy theories in connection with the unrest on the platform.

When Elon Musk bought the site in 2022, he reduced content moderation. A year later, far-right activist Tommy Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, was reinstated to the X-Team after a five-year ban.

Last weekend, while relaxing in Cyprus, Robinson posted inflammatory messages to his followers on X.

Although X has remained silent this week, his owner has not.

In his tweet about the unrest, Musk wrote: “Civil war is inevitable.” a post condemned by the Prime Minister’s spokesman.

Mr Musk then posted: “Why aren’t all communities protected in the UK?” and #TwoTierKeir – a hashtag that has been Accusations of “two-class policing”.

Mr Musk also deleted a picture he had shared that spread a conspiracy theory about the British construction “Internment camp” for rioters on the Falkland Islands.

“I think technology companies are often hesitant to get involved in politically charged situations,” Matt Navarra, a social media expert, told BBC News.

“I think they’re afraid of alienating parts of their user base or getting embroiled in regulatory disputes.”

He said it was a “strategic calculation.”

“By remaining silent, they hope that public attention will be directed elsewhere and they can avoid direct responsibility,” he added.

In his opinion, corporate profits would take precedence over “public safety and social responsibility.”

Adam Leon Smith, Fellow of BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, said the silence was “incredibly disrespectful” to the public.

Media analyst Hanna Kahlert of Midia Research said they did not want to say things they could publicly for fear of being held accountable for those comments later.

“They’re probably going to be very careful about how they say this because it will determine their future strategy – what they can do, what their algorithms encourage, what activities generate advertising revenue for them.”

The Online Safety Act, which is due to come into force early next year, will give the regulator further powers.

Ofcom published an open letter to the platforms saying they should not wait before taking action.

But some – including London Mayor Sadiq Khan – are already questioning whether that is enough.

The Prime Minister said on Friday: “After these riots, we need to look at social media more broadly.”

Prof Lorna Woods, professor of internet law at the University of Essex, who helped draft the legislation, told BBC News: “If the law were fully in place, it would not cover all content. Organising a riot would be covered, but some dog-whistling tactics and disinformation would not.”

Two-thirds of the British public want social media companies to be held more accountable, according to a YouGov poll this week.

The big tech companies seem to have no say, but they may find that others are leading them to a very different future in the UK.