culture.gov.au

Connecting you with Australian culture online

Complaints and classification of content

Australian Communications and Media Authority

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) is responsible for the regulation of online content as well as administering and investigating a complaints process.  ACMA is responsible for and administers an industry co-regulatory scheme for Internet content under a Public Code of Practice.  The co-regulatory scheme is established under Schedule 5 of the Broadcasting Services Act 1992 aims to set out obligations to address community concerns about illegal and offensive content on the Internet.  Complaints may be made to ACMA about Internet content that is, or may be, prohibited by law. 

Office of Film & Literature Classification

Under the Broadcasting Services Act 1992, the following categories of Internet content are prohibited: Internet content that is classified Restricted Content (RC) or X by the Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) Board.

The Act was later amended in 2005 to deal specifically with child pornography as prohibited content.

OFLC provides guidance on the way it grades and categorises and why it makes decisions on whether content is deemed to contain obscene, offensive or racist material, through its published reports. The Classification Board is also responsible for classifying internet content referred to it by ACMA. 

The Culture and Recreation Portal currently uses the OFLC Board definition of what is restricted material to determine 'prohibited content'.  It also uses the Classification Board Guidelines about what is deemed offensive.

State and territory laws also impose obligations on producers of content and persons who upload or access content.  The Commonwealth Crimes Act 1914 makes it an offence to intentionally use an Internet carriage service to menace or harass, or in such a way to communicate material that would be regarded by reasonable persons as offensive.

ACMA Codes of practice for Internet content providers

The Culture and Recreation Portal is obliged to conform to the codes for industry co-regulation for content provision.  As an Internet content provider, the Portal has a responsibility to:

• not place on the service any content that is in contravention of any of the relevant Australian State, Territory or Commonwealth laws, including the Broadcasting Services Act 1992 (s.6.3 (b));
• provide information to users that they have a right to make complaints to ACMA about prohibited content and which procedures apply (s.6.5); and
• provide information about content filtering to users as a result of the obligations of content hosts (s.6.5). 

Filtering obligation, products and services

The Portal currently provides a manual filtering service for websites which it deems to be offensive. ACMA provides a list of client-side PC-based site filter products and services currently scheduled under this Code. 

Users who may be concerned about retrieving and viewing material which they think may be offensive to them - or who exercise a supervisory role with others - should consider installing suitable filtering software on their computers to avoid downloading potentially offensive material.