The Australian: $50m bill for policing child cyber bullies

Taxpayers will spend $50 million to referee children’s cyber-bullying disputes over the next four years, triggering a government plea for parents to control their kids’ internet use.

Yesterday, Paul Fletcher, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Communications, urged parents to check what their children were doing online. He said primary school children, as well as teenagers, were suffering as bullies turned to social media.

Mr Fletcher said during his visits to schools, he found that 60 per cent to 70 per cent of 10-year-olds ­admitted they had a Facebook or other social media account, even though the sites are supposed to be restricted to the over-13s.

“Parents need to be aware of what their children are doing ­online,’’ he told The Australian . “The central responsibility sits with the parent when it comes to the safety of the child, and schools also have a role to play. It is a policy of social media services that children under 13 should not use the service, and that is something parents should take into account.’’

The federal government will spend $50m over the next four years funding the Office of the Children’s e-Safety Commissioner, to be launched next month.

Australian children, or their parents or guardians, will be able to complain to commissioner Alastair MacGibbon if they believe they have been the target of cyber bullies.

Mr MacGibbon, who founded the Australian Federal Police High Tech Crime Centre and is a former executive of eBay, will have the power to fine social media companies up to $17,000 for failing to remove offensive ­material within 48 hours.

He can also direct the person who posted the offensive material to take it down, destroy it and apologise to the target.

The commissioner will deal only with cyber-bullying material that is likely to have the effect of “seriously threatening, intimidating, harassing or humiliating” an Australian child. Children will not be able to get explicit “selfies’’ or “sexting’’ erased from the internet unless the material is deemed to be bullying.

Mr Fletcher said that kids who posted provocative “selfies’’ might not be covered by the e-safety commissioner. “There certainly will be situations where the dissemination of explicit photos of an individual would fall under the definition of cyber bullying, if it’s being done to intimidate or harass,’’ he said. “It probably is not a good idea to let your child have a smartphone in their bedroom overnight because it means they have access to social media.’’

Mr Fletcher said the proliferation of web-enabled devices — including phones, iPods, tablets and portable computers — made it hard for parents to monitor their children’s internet use.

“The internet is a pervasive feature of modern childhood, and ­social media is very heavily used,’’ he said. “It’s clearly something that is daunting and confusing for many parents, simply because the landscape is moving so quickly.’’

The Australian revealed this month how the internet is spawning a generation of hypersexualised children, who are requiring medical treatment for injuries as they mimic pornography online.