The Law Council provided a submission to the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts in relation to the Exposure Draft of the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2023 (the Draft Bill).
For the purposes of the Draft Bill ‘misinformation’ is defined to include content provided on the digital service that ‘contains information that is false, misleading or deceptive’ and is ‘reasonably likely to cause or contribute to serious harm’. 1 ‘Disinformation’ is defined similarly, but includes the added requirement that ‘the person disseminating, or causing the dissemination of, the content intends that the content deceive another person’. 2
The Law Council is grateful for the contributions of its National Human Rights Committee, the Law Institute of Victoria, and the Victorian Bar to this submission.
1 Exposure Draft, Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2023 (Cth) (‘Draft Bill’) s 7(1).
2 Ibid s 7(2).
Last Updated on 01/09/2023