Minutes/Policy Development Committee/Enhancing Online Safety for Children Inquiry WG/2014-01-30

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Meeting Minutes
This document is a record of a meeting. Do not edit this document without contacting the relevant group first.

Attendance

  • Bill McLean (Chair)
  • Laura Killian
  • Trevor Dadson
  • Andrew Downing
  • Mark Walkom
  • Simon Frew
  • Mozart Olbrycht-Palmer

Minutes

Opening comments

  • It seems there are three main proposals:
    • Establish a children's e-safety commissioner
    • A complaints system for cases when a site refuses to take down material harmful to a child
    • Creating a new offence of cyber-bulling.
  • The report is short on hard data
    • There is a claim that 50% of teenagers have been "exposed to cyber-bulling" but not necessarily victims of it.
  • Also seems to talk about setting up a take-down request channel, and asks if 48 hours is a fast enough response time.
  • The Internet doesn't play well with national boundaries.
  • "Cyber-bullying" isn't different from other bullying, except it doesn't need to be face-to-face.

Immediacy

  • 48 hours takedown time is quick in terms of getting someone to review and remove content, but it's ancient history on the social media site itself.
    • Minutes can be an issue for some things.
  • Facebook's response time (for example) is virtually immeasurable: sometimes quick, sometimes slow.
  • Resources to meet the takedown time might overwhelm the Commissioner's Office.
  • A process to immediately suppress content for a short period of time while it is reviewed would be more appropriate to meet the time needs.
    • Would need a counter-mechanism in place to avoid abuse.
    • Automatic suppression is an instant ability to abuse free speech and usually has very little cost or blowback to the complainant.
    • Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) take-downs show that false complainants suffer very little or no consequence.
  • Children are less supervised online compared to offline; one is less inhibited when adults aren't listening.
    • Collective counter-bullying activities may be more effective.
      • Could lead to cultural change.
  • Naming and shaming of websites that are slow to react to take-down requests is floated as an idea to improve response times in the discussion paper.
    • A website would be labelled as "unsafe for children" if slow to react.
    • Are children going to avoid sites because they get named and shamed?
      • Probably not. See, e.g. 4chan.
    • Most sites wouldn't be worried as long as money rolls in.
    • Parents could block offending sites?
      • Could work, though obviously tech-savvy children would be able to get around it.
      • Blocking sites is like banning a certain playground — it won't stop the bullying.
  • Responding to a take-down request hours later is a waste of effort.
    • Even if content is removed from one site, it will pop up again somewhere else.
  • General agreement that the take-down idea won't work.
    • Some opinion that a penalty for false take-down requests might work.
      • Countered by anonymous/pseudonymous sites or creating a new account/having multiple accounts.
    • The data spreads rapidly, how can you effectively take it down?

Cyber-bulling offence

  • Threats via phone also apply to the Internet.
    • 7 years for threats over a carriage service, even if not causing actual fear or apprehension.
  • Idea is that penalties would be much less ($1,000 fine) but be more frequently applied.
  • Only example of positive press on the proposals: http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2013/s3931058.htm

Cultural attitudes

  • How do you teach kids that the same rules apply for things you say online and offline?
  • Trying to teach kids about better behaviour would be a good approach.
  • A lot of bad behaviour could be learned from parents.
  • "Peer-regulated behaviour"
  • When the Government and parents treat something as bad and to be warded against, it grows the problem, creating adversarial situations.
    • When we go the other way and embrace the Internet as inherent in our culture and teach good behaviour, then all is well.
  • Children probably don't make the distinction between online and offline as strong as their parents do.

Summing up

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