Tech giants grilled on online safety

The federal government wants to introduce the laws to force social media platforms to take down offending posts and, in some circumstances, reveal the identity of anonymous posters. 

The social media companies said they have a commercial interest in keeping Australians safe online because otherwise they would lose users. 

Google Australia representative Lucinda Longcroft said when assessing content, the company guidelines took into account the context.

"While I might personally find content objectionable, our guidelines are enforced by trained trust and safety employees who look both at the nature of the material … and the context," she said.

Labor MP Tim Watts questioned Ms Longcroft on Google's "three strikes" policy for YouTube, where accounts that post content against company guidelines three times are closed.

He referenced nine complaints he had made against videos on the United Australia Party's YouTube channel. 

He said six videos were taken down as a result of the complaints but the account was still active.

Ms Longcroft said if a number of complaints are made at the same time they are bundled into one "strike". 

Meanwhile, Meta policy head Mia Garlick said any reports Facebook put profits above the safety of their users are "categorically untrue". 

"Safety is at the core of our business," she told the committee. 

UAP MP Craig Kelly - who was banned from Facebook in 2021 for posting misleading content about COVID-19 - said the company had "blood on their hands" for stopping information on treatments for the virus from being posted. 

But Ms Garlick said Facebook would take the same action against a user whether or not they were a public figure. 

"Where it comes to harmful health misinformation (our policies) are applied across the board regardless of who is making the claims," she said.