First introduced in 2015, the Enhancing Online Safety (Non-Consensual Sharing of Intimate Images) Bill 2018 seeks to criminalise image-based abuse. Passing on Tuesday, Shadow Minister for Communications, Michelle Rowland MP, has said that the proposed civil penalties regime is a “step in the right direction”. With perpetrators being subject to civil penalties of up to $105,000, corporations are also liable to fines up to $525,000.
The amendments passed by the Senate include changing the Criminal Code Act 1995 to establish a specific criminal offence. The Bill will provide the eSafety Commissioner with the power to use “removal notices”?—?requiring removal of the image within 48 hours?—?to perpetrators, social media services and website and content hosts. With 4 out of 5 Australians saying that non-consensual sharing of sexual images should be a crime, all state and territories are in the process of criminalising non-consensual sharing of intimate images.
The Government has also committed $10 million to support survivors of image-based abuse, including $4.8 million for the eSafety Commissioner to develop and implement a national online complaints portal for image-based abuse. The Bill will now make its way to the House of Representatives, representing a key component of the eSafety Commissioner’s eSafety Women initiative to combat technologically facilitated abuse against women.
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