Hot on the heels of its conservative older brother, New Zealand is taking censorship to entirely new level that renders online communications open to legal scrutiny. This past week, the nation’s parliament has approved something known as the Harmful Digital Communications Bill, a bill that render online trolling illegal. Perpetrators facing fines or imprisonment.
A new agency is being established to help enforce the new laws and liaise with Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms in order to help expedite the content’s removal.
According to bill, digital communications cannot legally: “Disclose sensitive personal facts about another person, be threatening and intimidating, be indecent or obscene, make false allegations, contain a matter this is published in breach of confidence, incite or encouraging anyone to send a message to an individual for purpose of causing harm to the individual, depreciate an individual by reason of his or her color, race, ethnic/national origin, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or disability.” Presumably, telling someone in an online interaction to “go kill yourself” is now illegal.
As for the US, itself: The act of trolling doesn’t explicitly carry criminal ramifications under federal law, however, when the act of harassment, stalking, or cyber-bullying creates a “credible threat to the person’s safety,” law enforcement be contacted. The specifics vary on a state by state basis, (Arizona, attempted to outlaw harassment over electronic devices back in 2012) but defamation, invasion of privacy, and portrayal in a false light are all civil actions that can be leveraged against a troll.
The UK deals asserts a similar approach to that of the United States; trolling isn’t illegal, but social media messages which “specifically target an individual or individuals and which may constitute harassment or stalking” may be a criminal offence, especially if supplemented by “grossly offensive, indecent, obscene or false” or “ a credible threat of violence.”
Three separate laws are in place for dealing with the circumstances but sentences can vary depending on which of the three laws is used to prosecute. Sentencing can vary from two to five years, but the average is 18 weeks. Back in September 2011, a man was jailed for 18 weeks for mocking victims of a teenage shooting by posting pictures of dead victims on Facebook.
Source: BBC and Findlaw.com
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