A draft bill from the Australian government has warned technology and social media giants to remove false information from their platforms or be prepared to pay hefty fines.
The new draft bill will see the country’s media regulator – the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) – armed with the power to oblige digital platforms such as Google and Facebook to maintain records about misinformation and disinformation on their platforms.
These companies must provide these records at any time the ACMA asks.
In addition, the ACMA will be able to request and implement an industry-wide “code of practice” introducing new measures to combat misinformation. The ACMA is able to develop and enforce its own industry standards.
Any breach of this proposed new standard could see the tech giants pay a hefty maximum penalty with fines of up to $4.6 million ($6.88 million AUD) or 5% of global turnover. For perspective, 5% of Facebook’s parent company Meta’s global turnover amounts to approximately $5.3 billion ($8 billion AUD).
According to a June 26 ABC report, Federal Communications Minister Michelle Rowland said the current Labor government is “committed to keeping Australians safe online.”
The new bill will ensure that “the ACMA has the powers it needs to hold digital platforms to address error and disinformation on their services,” according to Rowland.
Rowland added that the bill would allow AMCA “to look at the bottom of what the platforms are doing and what steps they are taking to ensure compliance.”
Online safety is a shared responsibility. We all have a role to play in protecting Australians from scams, error and disinformation, and cyber abuse.
Today I’m meeting with the Meta team, including their Global VP for Public Policy, Joel Kaplan, to discuss how we can do that. pic.twitter.com/l8BiKS1yee
– Michelle Rowland (@MRowlandMP) June 6, 2023
Some worry that the proposed legislation could have a significant impact on free speech, especially considering the bill’s definition of misinformation — which remains open to interpretation.
The draft bill defines misinformation as “unintentionally false, misleading or deceptive content. Disinformation is defined as “false information intended to be disseminated to cause serious harm.”
David Coleman, Shadow Minister for Communications from the opposition Liberal Party raised his concerns, saying “this is a complex policy area and government overreach must be avoided”.
“[The] The public wants to know who decides whether a particular piece of content is misinformation or disinformation,” he added.
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The public consultation for the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2023 ends on Sunday, August 6.
The Australian government has been pushing hard to bring in the tech giants for a long time. On August 12, Google coughed up a $40 million ($60 million AUD) fine for misleading Australian consumers about data collection.
In February 2021, Facebook temporarily banned Australian users from viewing or sharing news content in their newsfeeds after a conflict with the government escalated over proposed media bargaining laws.
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