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Opinion
Editorial
by SCMP Editorial
Editorial
by SCMP Editorial
Wide-ranging debate needed before laws to regulate the internet
- While governments and even Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg have called for online regulation in the wake of the Christchurch shootings, the challenge lies in finding a way of curbing abuses while not restricting the benefits
The days when anything could go on the internet have passed. Social media, once hailed as an essential beacon of democracy and free speech, has now also been recognised as a purveyor of dangerous, disruptive or harmful ideas. The Christchurch mosque shootings, live-streamed by the alleged killer on Facebook, has been a turning point, spurring action by governments and even a call by the platform’s founder and chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, for regulation. But as urgent as the matter may seem, wide-ranging discussion and debate has to go before haste.
Australia rushed to put in place sweeping legislation that threatens big fines and jail for executives of social media companies that do not quickly remove “abhorrent, violent material”. The laws were drawn up and approved by lawmakers in just five days, without consultation and despite the protests of the tech industry, traditional media, legal experts and civil society. Politicians were driven by the public disgust and backlash against Facebook, Instagram and YouTube, which even hours after the attack, were struggling to stop the video from being shared. There are now understandable concerns about enforcement and the impact on legitimate speech.
But there are many aspects to keeping social media firms in check. Germany last year enacted legislation to tackle hate speech by forcing the companies to monitor and remove content determined to be dangerous. Last Monday, Britain began a consultation process to regulate online child pornography and terrorist propaganda. Singapore is focusing on so-called fake news. But perhaps most worrying is the content that can incite the spreading of rumours and violence, and has already led to deaths in a number of countries, including Sri Lanka, Myanmar and India.
At the heart of the problem is the vast amount of information being put on the internet every second. The resources needed to police so much content are vast, as Beijing, with its internet “great wall” of censorship well knows. It is why Zuckerberg, with the Christchurch shooting adding to the pressure from the Cambridge Analytica privacy scandal and leaking of the data of 540 million Facebook users, issued a plea for governments and regulators to help rein in the internet. His words came weeks after Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, said that by updating the rules for the internet, “we can preserve what’s best about it”.
Governments have their own priorities, but they can learn from one another on the way forward. On data protection and copyright, for example, the European Union has already put in place laws that could serve as a model or point of reference. The challenge lies in finding a way of curbing abuses while not restricting the benefits.
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