As part of the Albanese Government’s commitment to ensuring Australians are protected by world-leading online safety laws, the Government will be legislating a Digital Duty of Care.
The Digital Duty of Care will place the onus on digital platforms to proactively keep Australians safe and better prevent online harms.
The duty of care model is a key recommendation of the independent statutory review of the Online Safety Act 2021 undertaken by Ms Delia Rickard PSM.
The legislated duty will future-proof the Online Safety Act, and put the legal responsibility for keeping Australians safe on tech companies. It will ensure Australians continue to benefit from world-leading online safety protections under the Act.
Aligned with United Kingdom and European Union approaches, digital platforms will be required to take reasonable steps to prevent foreseeable harms on their platforms and services, with the framework to be underpinned by risk assessment and risk mitigation, and informed by safety-by-design principles.
Legislating a duty of care will mean services can’t ‘set and forget’. Instead, their obligations will mean they need to continually identify and mitigate potential risks, as technology and service offerings change and evolve.
The changes will place proactive obligations on platforms under the Online Safety Act, and work with the existing complaint and removal schemes for illegal and harmful material that currently exists under the Act.
The Albanese Government brought forward the statutory review of the Online Safety Act by a year to ensure Australia’s world-leading online safety laws are contemporary and fit-for-purpose.
Legislating a duty of care is the first step in delivering against the review and will ensure greater protections for all Australians online.
A duty of care will complement the Government’s decision to legislate a minimum age of 16 for access to social media.
The Albanese Government is considering the recommendations made as part of the independent statutory review to ensure appropriate protections are in place to combat new and emerging online harms.
Quotes attributable to the Minister for Communications, the Hon Michelle Rowland MP:
“The Albanese Government is committed to keeping Australians safe online.
“Online services operating in Australia can do more to proactively protect their users – which is why our Government is developing a Digital Duty of Care.
“The duty of care will put the onus on industry to prevent online harms at a systemic level, instead of individuals having to ‘enter at their own risk’.
“Australia’s online safety laws are world-leading, but they aren’t a set-and-forget.
“We brought forward the review of the Online Safety Act to ensure it is fit-for-purpose. Legislating a duty of care is a key step in delivering on the review and ensuring greater protections for all Australians online.”
