Like banks, self-regulation of Google, Facebook not working
Trolls and bullies are everywhere. Our own region has plenty.
Gympie
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TODAY is Safer Internet Day, an annual worldwide event aimed at creating a safer internet for all.
It is a small step in the right direction but it is urgently clear that much, much more needs to be done.
The global awareness day encourages people to navigate the online world safely by developing four critical skills: respect, responsibility, reasoning and resilience; something missing from many engagements I have observed and been subjected to online.
For too many badly informed, extremely angry people, the internet has provided the perfect platform to spread fake news, venom and hate without having to be accountable or even reveal their real name.
Trolls and bullies are everywhere. Our own region has plenty.
Worse, Police Minister Mark Ryan talked yesterday about the "pain, trauma and suffering” of the evil world of internet facilitated atrocities against children.
Too many of those crimes start with a stranger requesting images or video from a child online, he said.
Then there are the countless cases of identity theft and scams targeting vulnerable people - the elderly, the lonely, the naive.
To compare elements of the internet to the pits of hell is not unfair.
Has Facebook made the world a better place or worse? The answer is worse.
The internet has eliminated international borders and is a great tool for so many things, but the law - yet again - has failed to keep pace with reality. It needs a kick up the bum.
Governments must stop sitting on their hands and give the law that kick. Google and Facebook gobble up 85 per cent of global online advertising but, like the banks, self-regulation is not working. Greed is a powerful and destructive force. Money and profit at the expense of everything and everyone else.
It has to change.
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