Fiji should expect stronger laws surrounding online posting and strengthening of the powers of the Online Safety Commission by year end, says Information Minister Lynda Tabuya.

She said this in Parliament yesterday in response to a question from Opposition parliamentarian Faiyaz Koya, who had asked if the State was looking at a major change in legislation due to the level of irresponsibility expressed by some Fijians on social media platforms.

“I can confirm from my discussion with the Online Safety Commissioner as well as the Law Reform Commission that they are already underway with reviewing and strengthening the laws, the Online Safety Act. They have actually appointed Law Reform Commissioners specifically for this task so the office of the Attorney General as well as the Law Reform Commission are now working with the Online Safety Commission. They’ve actually invested funding in securing these Law Reform commissioners to undertake this work – hopefully to bring it before the end of the year. Certainly, we do need to strengthen the law, we need to give the Online Safety Commission more teeth, they are also still appealing to have prosecutorial powers as well, so hopefully that happens as well in this legislative reform.”

Tabuya said at present, the Fiji Police Force Cybercrime Unit was investigating as well as prosecuting.
However, she said they are inundated and overworked and the Online Safety Commission would welcome any legislative review that gives them prosecutorial powers as well.

“Because there are thousands and thousands of complaints every day and there is always concern about the amount of time it takes to take down content that is harmful is not moving fast enough.

So the laws need to be able to give that kind of power to the Online Safety Commissioner to issue take down notices as well as issuing penalties to the big tech companies for not complying.”