The digital revolution has brought huge benefits, and can bring more, but there have also been serious harms, with more to come. Australia needs to act immediately, as many other countries are doing, to maximise innovation and to minimise the harms to businesses and consumers.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission published a report a year ago that recommended regulatory codes of conduct to deal with competition issues with the most powerful platforms, as well as measures to protect consumers from, say, scams and fake reviews. As yet, however, there has been no response from the government.