Over 500 cases of online harms reported to S’pore agency in first two months; youngest victim aged 7

The newly minted Online Safety Commission (OSC) received more than 500 reports of online harms within two months of its launch.

Close to one-fifth of eligible reports involved victims aged 18 and below, with the youngest being a seven-year-old victim of doxing, said the OSC on Sept 22.

The commission declined to specify how many of the over 500 reports were deemed eligible.

It began operations on June 29 to address victims’ frustrations with slow platform responses, by granting the agency legal authority to force entities such as platforms and group administrators to quickly remove harmful content through takedown orders.

For a start, the 40 employee-strong OSC is tackling five of the most prevalent and serious online harms: intimate image abuse, image-based child abuse, doxing, online harassment and online stalking.

Doxing and online harassment made up the bulk of eligible reports submitted to the OSC, which received an equal number of complaints from both men and women.

Ineligible reports include those involving online harms that the OSC plans to deal with at a later date. These include online impersonation, inauthentic material or deepfake abuse, online instigation of disproportionate harm, incitement of violence and enmity, non-consensual disclosure of private information, and the publication of false material or reputationally harmful statements.

Over 90 per cent of reports deemed eligible were resolved by the OSC. Unresolved cases typically involved unresponsive platforms, websites or communicators, which the OSC will investigate.

The OSC is backed by the newly enacted Online Safety (Relief and Accountability) Act, or OSRAA, allowing it to impose penalties if its directions to content creators, forum administrators and platforms for content takedowns or account restrictions are not followed.

These platforms include Facebook, HardwareZone Forums, Instagram, TikTok, X and YouTube.

Flouting OSC directions can lead to fines of up to $20,000 and jail terms of up to 12 months for individuals, or fines of up to $500,000 for entities. A further fine of up to $50,000 for each day the offence continues may be imposed after conviction.

“The OSC will also consider other options in its toolkit, such as to issue an access-blocking order to block a website that failed to comply with a direction issued by the Commissioner,” said the OSC.

In the debut episode of government podcast Let’s Table It on Sept 22, Minister for Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo said the OSRAA was created to provide timely relief to individuals who suffer from online harms.

The new series by the Ministry of Digital Development and Information will feature various policymakers and experts in each episode, with conversations that explore the decision-making behind policies and initiatives. New episodes will be released fortnightly.

Teo added that earlier regulations, such as the Code of Practice for Online Safety – Designated Social Media Services that came into effect in 2023, had dealt more with harms on a societal level.

Under the code, six social media platforms are obligated to tackle harmful content through community guidelines and content moderation measures, and provide user-friendly reporting mechanisms. Platforms that do not comply with the code may be fined up to $1 million under the Broadcasting Act.

“The victims still needed relief,” said Teo.

One of the cases that has been resolved by the OSC involved a victim of online sexual harassment, who had received unsolicited explicit content since 2022.

More than 1,000 artificial intelligence-generated deepfake nude images and videos of her were posted across multiple platforms. These were taken down after the OSC issued a direction to the platforms.

Another victim had been harassed, stalked and sent death threats on social media. The OSC directed the platforms to take down the offending accounts, and referred the victim to independent non-profit SHECARES for counselling and guidance.

While more people are becoming aware of the OSC as an avenue for help, more can be done to raise public awareness, said Singapore’s Commissioner of Online Safety Francis Ng, who was also featured on the podcast. He also highlighted the OSC’s first experience in questioning a communicator who had posted harmful content.

“He was very apologetic, and we were able to use that opportunity to educate him as to why what he had done was harmful, and how it had actually caused harm to the victim,” he said.

Ng added that he hopes to see fewer cases of online harms and an improved lived experience within the community, which is an indicator of the success of the OSC’s work.

Source: The Straits Times © SPH Media Limited. Permission required for reproduction.

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