Courier Mail: Sites to pay for hosting bullies

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

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 that social media organisations silence cyber-bullies by taking down offensive content directed at children.

Under the new laws, internet users - including other children 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 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, it will be placed under stricter controls and face legal requirements to obey the commissioner or face financial penalties.

Mr Fletcher said the Government planned to allocate a significant team of support staff drawn from the Department of Communications and the Australian Communications and Media Authority to the commissioner because it anticipated 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 Children's E-Safety 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 servicesplay 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.