Government Says No to New Cyber-Bullying Criminal Provisions
Monday 5 May 2014 @ 10.34 a.m. | Crime
The Federal Government has confirmed it will not be seeking to introduce new legislation to combat cyber-bullying on the internet. Paul Fletcher, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Communications, told the Queensland Police's Youth, Technology and Virtual Communities Conference that the government will instead use existing criminal measures. As reported by ZDNet, Mr Fletcher said:
“We have reached a view based on our consultations that introducing new criminal law provisions into the Commonwealth Criminal Code, specifically to deal with cyberbullying, is not something we intend to proceed with… There was strong support for better education and awareness about existing criminal offences covering cyberbullying behaviour.”
Mr Fletcher did suggest he would consider the possibility of developing a model code in conjunction with the State Attorneys-General.
The Current Proposal
One of the Coalition’s federal election promises was establishing a National Cyber-bullying Commissioner, who would have power to issue rapid removal orders for problematic content. However, the scheme faced opposition both from technological and media companies, and from critics who thought the legislation did not go far enough, as it was specifically directed at children only and left adults unprotected.
Opposition
As previously reported on Timebase, (see Charlotte's Law: Petition for Tougher Cyber Bullying Legislation) a petition on change.org achieved more than 200,000 signatures after it called for new legislation to deal specifically with cyberbullying, following the death of high-profile victim Charlotte Dawson. Twitter Australia in particular was singled out in the petition as a company who could be taking a more active role in preventing online abuse.
However, industry resistance has also been fierce. Concerns have been raised about the scheme’s focus only on large social media entities, which could leave smaller players unregulated. The industry argues that any changes would be merely increasing red tape, and that Government is ignoring procedures they already have in place for dealing with dubious content.
A statement by the Digital Industry Association of Australia’s CEO, David Holmes, also published on ZDNet said:
"Industry shares the concerns expressed by school, parent and consumer groups that the Government's proposals will not be effective to address cyberbullying. Rather than respond to the concerns raised by industry, by schools, by parents, and by consumer groups during the consultation phase, the government has dismissed them…There is still no evidence that the large social media sites, whom the government acknowledges have strong reputational reasons to be highly responsive to bullying complaints, are not already promptly removing bullying content when it is reported to them."
The Government’s watered down proposals will likely please neither group. Although the new criminal charges will not be introduced, the Government is still committed to the establishment of the Office of the Children's E-Safety Commissioner.
TimeBase is an independent, privately owned Australian legal publisher specialising in the online delivery of accurate, comprehensive and innovative legislation research tools including LawOne and unique Point-in-Time Products.
