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Labor won't stand in way of Morrison government's social media laws
Tough new measures designed to punish tech companies that fail to stop the spread of violent content on the internet are set to be rushed through Parliament, after federal Labor said it would set aside its concerns and support the legislation.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison last weekend announced plans in the wake of the Christchurch massacre to introduce laws would make it a criminal offence for online platforms to fail to rapidly remove "abhorrent violent material", including videos of terrorist attacks and murders.
Social media executives could face jail terms under new Australian laws. Credit: Bloomberg
Shadow Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus confirmed on Tuesday that Labor would not oppose the legislation, despite criticising the rushed timetable for its introduction in Parliament.
"Labor has serious concerns that this bill has been poorly drafted and will not achieve its intended purpose," he said. "[But] Labor will not stand in the way of this bill, despite our concerns."
Mr Morrison on the weekend promised the new laws would result in executives at social media platforms facing up to three years in jail, while tech companies could face multibillion-dollar fines of up to 10 per cent of their annual global turnover.
The move to impose tougher penalties on social media giants follows widespread global outrage over the live-streaming of the murderous rampage in Christchurch last month on Facebook. Videos of the attack spread rapidly across the internet after surfacing on other platforms including Google's YouTube and Twitter.
"Abhorrent violent material" could include videos of terrorists acts, murders, rape and kidnapping.
The bill is expected to be introduced to the Senate on Wednesday. There are only two sitting days left for the House of Representatives before an election is due.
Mr Dreyfus earlier this week described the timetable for passing the legislation as "ridiculous". On Tuesday, he pledged to refer the bill to a parliamentary committee on intelligence and security following the election.
And he questioned whether the wording of the bill would actually make it possible for the government to impose jail terms on executives at firms that breached the laws.
"The government’s bill has been so rushed that it fails to fulfil one of Scott Morrison’s key promises – there are no powers to jail social media executives," he said.
I worry about the perception that we are creating overseas is that this is a hard place to do business for tech companies.
Paul Bassat, Seek co-founder
Meanwhile, the lobbying organisation that represents Google, Facebook and Twitter, questioned the need for jail terms for tech executives, and criticised the rushed process around the proposed new laws.
“Announcing measures such as jailing staff at social media companies is inappropriate for a democracy such as Australia, and does not help the debate or solve the issue," Digital Industry Group managing director Sunita Bose said in a statement.
"It is...concerning that this legislation has been announced - with the government planning to rush it through Parliament in just three days - without any meaningful consultation with the digital industry, security, legal and technical experts, the intelligence community, the media, and civil society."
The government was criticised by the tech community for rushing through encryption laws designed to prevent terrorists from communicating on messaging apps on the final sitting day of 2018.
Paul Bassat, the co-founder of $6 billion employment website Seek, and a prominent tech investor for Square Peg Capital, said he was concerned more legislation rushed through Parliament could hurt Australia's reputation in the global tech community.
"I worry about the perception that we are creating overseas is that this is a hard place to do business for tech companies" he said.
Mr Bassat said social media companies should "absolutely" face stricter regulation around the content they host, but said jail terms and steep fines were "a step too far" for the government.
"There is a lot of content on social media that is problematic, and calls for social media companies to do a better job of getting that content down quickly is absolutely appropriate and fair and legitimate," he said.
"But suggestions that executives could be jailed as a consequence is frankly not a great idea and not understanding of the incredible level of difficulty in monitoring a vast volume of posts.
"I think we are entitled to call for them [social media giants] to do a better job, but to suggest jail terms or fines that are incredible excessive is a step too far.
"We need to find the right balance between holding them to account, and proposing legislation that frankly doesn't hit the mark."