The Federal Government has released an exposure draft of the Online Safety Amendment (Digital Duty of Care) Bill 2025 for targeted consultation.
The draft Bill seeks to require online services to provide a safer online environment and give social media users greater control over the content recommended to them. It would also give the eSafety Commissioner additional powers to address some forms of harm online.
Commissioner powers.
At present, one of the ways in which the new laws seek to achieve a safer online environment is by providing the eSafety Commissioner with powers to issue notices requesting the removal or deletion of apps or websites that are designed for the purpose of, or otherwise predominately used for, the generation of fake nude material.
The Bill also purports to grant the eSafety Commissioner the power to make ‘link deletion notices’, where the Commissioner is satisfied that the link provides access to ‘cyber bullying material targeted at an Australian Child’.
Duty of Care
The draft Bill seeks to make online services responsible for providing a safe online environment; a requirement otherwise known as a ‘digital duty of care’.
To comply with this duty, the draft Bill states that such platforms must “manage design features of the service appropriately, including by providing user empowerment tools as required”.
As defined by the Bill:
“A user empowerment tool allows a user of an online service to manage the way design features of the service operate for the user, including, for example, by providing control over the kind of content that is recommended for the user.”
While not set out in the draft Bill, Mr Albanese has announced this would include a requirement of social media platforms to provide users the choice to opt in or opt out of personalised content recommendation algorithms, which, if successfully implemented, would “give Australians greater choice over their platforms and what they see”.
How we got here:
Although it is the Federal Government that has proposed these new laws, the ideas embedded in them are born out of years of research and advocacy that has revealed the pervasive nature of social media algorithms.
Not-for-profit organisation Teach Us Consent and their CEO, Chanel Contos, had campaigned for the Government to provide users of social media with an option to turn their algorithms off and on.
In an open letter to the Prime Minister signed by over 15,000 people, including former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Cheek Media CEO Hannah Furguson, Teach Us Consent highlighted how social mediaalgorithms are specifically designed to keep its users scrolling.
The letter emphasised how, by curating content driven by people’s strongest emotional reactions, algorithms have perpetuated dangerous and extremist ideologies.
“The algorithms that curate our feeds are designed to keep us scrolling. They prioritise content that provokes the strongest emotional reactions; outrage, validation, fear, arousal and anger drive ‘successful’ posts.” the letter read.
The organisations ‘Fix Our Feed’ ampaign, has drawn attention to research exposing how algorithms have directly contributed to the spread of extreme misogynistic content, worsening Australia’s National Crisis of gender-based violence.
As stated in their Open Letter, “Young men and boys are being pulled into misogynistic spaces, seeking community and belonging. Studies show that dummy accounts created to imitate 16–18-year-old boys were fed extreme “manosphere” content within minutes.”
Controversy:
Despite only being in its draft form, the bill has already generated plenty of controversy, particularly from politicians from the opposition.
Opposition Leader Angus Taylor and One Nation member Barnaby Joyce have opposed the new laws, arguing that it is a mechanism for the Labor Party to impose political censorship.
“This exposure draft is unacceptable in its current form because the reality is it’s providing a blank cheque for political censorship to the minister and to the government” Mr Taylor said.
Adelaide University Academic and anti-abortion activist Joanna Howe has even gone as far as labelling the proposed laws as an attack on free speech.
Experts such as Timothy Graham, Associate Professor from Queensland University of Technology, has admitted that the laws would adversely affect the attention and engagement they receive on social media.
While at the outset this may seem unfair, this change to engagement would, if realised, expose how political parties such as One Nation and the Liberal Party, and people such as Dr Howe, have relied upon generating content that arouses strong emotional reactions such as outrage and fear to increase their engagement and rope in their audience.
What happens next:
Canberra based think tank The Australian Institute’s, recent poll on digital duty of care received overwhelming public support.
Director of Corporate Regulation at The Australian Institute, Josh Bornstein said the tide has turned against Big Tech companies and the enormous harm that they cause.
“An astonishing 93% of Australians support laws that require Big Tech companies to stop promoting illegal and harmful content on their platforms and instead remove it. That support is strong right across party lines,” he said in a recent statement.
