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Australia: Proposed changes to digital regulation

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The Australian Government has introduced a raft of new digital legislation, including to combat misinformation and disinformation, and hate speech. It has also announced plans for minimum age requirements for social media.

In brief

September is turning out to be a significant month for developments to digital regulation in Australia.

The digital regulation developments are:

  1. The first-tranche of long-anticipated reforms to the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) was announced, which include both the anti-doxxing and the statutory tort of invasion of privacy, as discussed in our client alert here. 
  2. A proposal to introduce a federal minimum age requirement for social media has been announced, although the details of this proposal are not yet known.
  3. A revamped bill on misinformation and disinformation (Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024 (Cth) (“Misinformation and Disinformation Bill“)) has been introduced to Parliament. It seeks to combat misinformation and disinformation on “digital communication platforms”, and contains various amendments to the exposure draft bill which was released for public consultation in last year.
  4. The Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 (“Hate Crimes Bill“), which aims to strengthen existing legislation to combat hate crimes against targeted groups, has also been introduced to Parliament.
  5. Finally, on 13 September 2024, the Government opened public consultation on the new proposed Scams Prevention Framework.

Click here to access the full alert.

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Author

Adrian Lawrence is the head of the Firm's Asia Pacific Technology, Media & Telecommunications Group. He is a partner in the Sydney office of Baker McKenzie where he advises on media, intellectual property and information technology, providing advice in relation to major issues relating to the online and offline media interests. He is recognised as a leading Australian media and telecommunications lawyer.

Author

Andrew Stewart leads the Intellectual Property & Technology Practice Group in Australia and the Firm's Global Digital Media & Copyright Content practice Business Unit. He is also a member of the Firm's Asia Pacific Intellectual Property & Technology Steering Committee. Andrew has significant in-house experience in one of Australia's most successful television networks, giving him an insight into the media environment in Australia and is an advisory board member of the Melbourne University Centre for Media and Communications in the Law.

Author

Allison Manvell is a special counsel in the Technology, Communications and Commercial, and Media & Content, teams at Baker McKenzie. Allison works across Baker McKenzie's Sydney and Brisbane offices. Allison has more than ten years' experience advising on commercial and regulatory matters across a range of industries with a particular focus on digital media, technology, broadcasting and content licensing and regulation. Allison has also spent time on client secondment within the media industry. She is a member of the Communications and Media Law Association and she speaks and presents regularly on legal issues relevant to convergence and digital media.

Author

Nick is a senior associate in the Media and Content team, within the IPTech practice and acts on a variety of commercial, advisory and litigious matters. Nick advises and represents a range of clients in the media and publishing, IT, communications, and FMCG industries, including in relation to intellectual property (with a strong focus on copyright) and advertising law. Acting for licensees in the Copyright Tribunal has been a significant part of his practice in the last several years.
Prior to joining Baker McKenzie he worked in-house at NineMSN, now Nine Digital.
Nick's work also focuses on copyright enforcement strategies in a digital context, and he has represented a range of international and domestic rightsholders in anti-piracy proceedings.

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