Submission to Social Media and Online Safety inquiry

Our call to rein in big tech 'rogue states'

Late last year the Federal Government launched an inquiry into social media and online safety. The inquiry followed the announcement of new anti-trolling legislation which would force social media companies to hand over the identities of anonymous trolls to individuals pursuing defamation charges.

#BigTech facilitating harms to kids: CS gives evidence to #SocialMedia inquiry

'If govts care about the wellbeing of vulnerable young people especially, then they really have no choice but to bring rogue states into line.'

Read more> https://t.co/psVUKokwz3@MelTankardReist pic.twitter.com/7MT8UQWcjb

— Collective Shout (@CollectiveShout) February 6, 2022

In our submission to the inquiry we highlighted evidence from our almost-three-year investigation into predatory activity on Instagram.

We called for:

• provisions in the Bill dealing with online trolling, abuse and serious threats to be expanded to enable re-dress beyond ‘defamation’;
• quicker take down times for image-based abuse content (so-called ‘revenge porn’);
• for our Government to continue to condemn Meta’s (Facebook parent company) planned rollout of end-to-end encryption across its messaging services - a move which would put children at greater risk of sexual exploitation.

Click on the image below to read our full submission. 

See also

Bring social media companies to account for harms to young people: CS appears before social media inquiry

A full list of submissions to the inquiry can be viewed here.