Overview
- Parliament approved the Online Safety (Relief and Accountability) Bill after more than eight hours of debate, rejecting Workers’ Party amendments including a fair comment carve-out and a higher evidentiary threshold.
- The Online Safety Commission can direct platforms, group administrators, content communicators, internet service providers or app stores to remove harmful material, restrict accounts or enable a victim’s right of reply.
- Victims gain civil remedies to seek damages from platforms and perpetrators, including compensation for loss of earnings and orders for an account of profits, with enhanced damages for recalcitrant offenders.
- The Commission may obtain a perpetrator’s identity information from platforms and disclose it to victims under strict conditions to pursue protection or legal action.
- Non-compliance can draw fines and jail for individuals and up to $500,000 for entities, with access blocking or app removal orders available, and a phased scope beginning with harassment, doxing, stalking, intimate image abuse and image-based child abuse, with appeals limited to the Commissioner and an independent panel.