Down Under Blunder

Australia goes the Big Brother route:

The laws would penalize companies for enabling misinformation with fines of up to 5% of their global revenue for failing to prevent the spread of misinformation, requiring tech companies to set codes of conduct specifically to tackle misinformation through an approved regulator. The laws would also introduce a punishment of up to seven years in jail for doxxing someone – the term for when an individual either publicly reveals private information about another person online or uses that information for exploitation – and parents can sue for "serious invasions of privacy" related to their children, The Guardian reported. The government scrapped a previous version of the laws after facing widespread condemnation, and the Free Speech Union of Australia argued that the new laws failed to address "key issues" raised from the first effort "despite the outpouring of public concern." The new laws have drawn similar ire from across the media landscape, with Elon Musk calling the Australian government "fascists" in a terse tweet about the topic. Labor Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones countered by calling Musk’s comment "crackpot stuff" and insisting that the issue was a matter of "sovereignty." "Whether it’s the Australian government or any other government around the world, we assert our right to pass laws which will keep Australians safe – safe from scammers, safe from criminals," Jones said in response. Storey, in a statement released last year when the government made clear its intention to press on with developing these penalties for alleged misinformation, called the effort "disingenuous," arguing that the government sought to "conflate the protection of Australians … with the federal government’s plan to empower bureaucrats in Canberra with the right to determine what is the official truth." "The federal government is cravenly using heightened concerns about current tensions in parts of our community, and the fears of parents and others about harmful online content, as a trojan horse to push forward laws that will in practice impose political censorship," Storey said.

Less freedom isn't the answer...