Time is up for trolls

ESafety scheme for bullies starts Sunday

ONLINE trolls will finally be unmasked and prosecuted when a world-first Australian program begins this weekend.

The eSafety Commission’s Adult Cyber Abuse scheme comes into force on Sunday, a move Commissioner Julie Inman Grant says should make abusers think twice before launching attacks online.

The program will be launched alongside other new powers for the commission, including the faster removal of image-based abuse, or “revenge porn”, and a boost to tackle child cyber-bullying.

Ms Inman Grant said the new cyber abuse scheme would deter the worst trolls.

“Right now you can abuse another human online with relatively reckless abandon,” Ms Inman Grant said.

“The worst thing that will happen is that you might get suspended. If you’re crafty, you might be using multiple email accounts and creating fake and impostor accounts to terrorise someone or a group of people, but it won’t be as easy to do that any more. This does give us some robust new powers. If people think they’re going to be able to hide behind the shield of anonymity, we’ll have investigative tools to identify who you are.”

Under the scheme, the commission will be able to investigate complaints about abuse that online platforms have refused to remove and demand content be deleted within 24 hours.

Social networks and other platforms that do not comply could face fines of as much as $555,000, while individuals could be publicly identified, taken to court, and fined as much as $111,000.

The scheme will be the first of its kind for adult victims, and will follow a similar antibullying scheme for children launched in 2015.

The new scheme will feature higher thresholds for complaints, however. Under the Act, online abuse against adults must be “intended to cause harm” and “menacing, harassing or offensive in all the circumstances” before the commission can act.

Ms Inman Grant said the commission had also hired new investigators to look into complaints as the threats were likely to be more harmful.

“When you’re dealing with adults experiencing cyber abuse, it’s often quite traumatic. You have to deal with adults differently,” she said.

Swinburne University senior social media lecturer Belinda Barnet said she welcomed the new program. “If you’re an adult and you experience that abuse online you have to go through this hall of mirrors to report it and there’s no recourse at all,” she said.