Cairns Post: Cyber laws to hit big firms

SOCIAL media giants such as Facebook and Instagram will face fines of up to $17,000 a day if they repeatedly refuse to take down offensive and harassing material directed at Aussie kids.

The anti-trolling legislation will be introduced today by the Federal Government, which will create a new authority to fight cyber bullying.

The office of the Children's E-Safety Commissioner will be empowered to demand social media organisations silence cyber bullies by taking down offensive content which is directed at kids.

Under the new laws, internet users - including other kids who post offensive material can also be directed to take down the remarks and apologise to the child, or face a Federal Court injunction.

Parliamentary secretary for communications, Paul Fletcher, said $17,000 fines would be issued to large social media companies that repeatedly failed to take down harmful cyber bullying material "for each day that the service does not act in response to the Commissioner".

"The way it's been set up is to make sure that the large social media service has a strong incentive to comply, because they know if they don't they are exposed to this risk," Mr Fletcher said.

The legislation will place big social media companies like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram on a two-tiered monitoring scheme, where they are first able to submit themselves to comply voluntarily with the take-down commands issued by the Commissioner.

But if the organisation fails to comply with voluntary orders, they will be placed under stricter controls and face legal requirements to obey the Commissioner or face financial penalties.

Mr Fletcher said the government plans to allocate a significant team of support staff drawn from the Department of Communication and the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) to the Commissioner because it anticipates there may be "significant complaint volumes".

Research previously released by the government has shown one in five children are victims of online bullying.

The Alannah and Madeline Foundation's chief executive Judith Slocombe said the new laws and the creation of the ESafety Commissioner "will be an important step in addressing harmful online content and encouraging positive social norms for online behaviour".

"The proposed approach recognises the important role social media services play in promoting the wellbeing of their users, and this will help minimise the impact of harmful material by facilitating the rapid removal of such content," Dr Slocombe said.