eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant says she will begin operating a reporting scheme for adult cyber abuse next year as part of the new Online Safety Act.
“This will give Australian adults who are the victims of seriously harmful online abuse somewhere to turn if the online service providers have failed to act on reports to them,” Ms Inman Grant said.
She said in the lead up to the scheme, eSafety had released detailed regulatory guidance, giving an overview of actions the eSafety Commissioner could take to address serious online abuse reported to her.
“This is a world-first scheme,” Ms Inman Grant said.
“From the end of January, we will be able to act as a safety net to give Australian adults who have been subjected to serious online abuse somewhere to turn if the online service providers have failed to act in removing the abusive content,” she said.
“If a platform fails to take action, people can come to us to make a report.
“Our new investigative and information-gathering powers will allow us to investigate and assess complaints, and decide what action we can take.”
Ms Inman Grant said this type of online abuse was becoming an all-too-common occurrence.
“If a report meets the threshold, we can issue a notice to the platform to get that harmful content removed,” she said.
The Commissioner said at that point, the platform had 24 hours to comply and failure to do so could involve significant civil penalties.
“The bar for determining what ‘adult cyber abuse’ is has been set deliberately high, to ensure it does not stifle freedom of speech,” she said.
“We are talking here about the most serious of abusive posts, intended to cause serious psychological or physical harm,” Ms Inman Grant said.
