Elon Musk has hit again at Anthony Albanese because the pair proceed to spar over the Australian authorities’s try and power the American tech billionaire to take away graphic content material from his social media platform X.
X, previously Twitter, was ordered by the Federal Courtroom late on Monday to dam all customers from viewing footage associated to an alleged terror assault by a 16-year-old boy on an Assyrian bishop throughout a live-streamed service in a western Sydney church on April 15.
The corporate stated it had quickly complied with the order in Australia whereas it fights it in court docket – however argued a world takedown order violates the precept of free speech – some extent which has been hammered dwelling by billionaire Musk.
A failure to adjust to a court docket’s ruling to take away posts may see X fined virtually $800,000 a day and executives be held in contempt of court docket.
On Tuesday, Musk shared a publish stating Mr Albanese had given X free promoting after the prime minister stated it was the one social media platform that hadn’t bowed to calls for by Australia’s eSafety commissioner.
‘I would wish to take a second to thank the PM for informing the general public that this platform is the one truthful one,’ Mr Musk stated.
Elon Musk has thanked Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for inadvertently selling X as a free-speech haven by attempting to power the platform to take away violent movies
Mr Musk has been brazenly mocking Anthony Albanese on his social media platform X
‘Our concern is that if ANY nation is allowed to censor content material for ALL nations, which is what the Australian “eSafety Commissar” is demanding, then what’s to cease any nation from controlling all the Web,’ Mr Musk stated.
‘We have now already censored the content material in query for Australia, pending authorized enchantment, and it’s saved solely on servers within the USA.
‘Ought to the eSafety Commissar (an unelected official) in Australia have authority over all nations on Earth?’
Mr Albanese branded Mr Musk as ‘boastful’ for defying the calls for of eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant – a former Twitter worker – which he stated have been solely imposing ‘widespread decency’.
‘He [Mr Musk] is somebody who is completely out of contact with the values that Australian households have,’ Mr Albanese stated.
‘He is placing his ego and placing his {dollars} in the direction of taking a court docket case for the proper to place extra violent content material on that can trigger misery to people who find themselves on his platform.
‘Different social media operators have accepted the choice of the eSafety Commissioner.
‘Certainly social media must have some component of social accountability,’ Mr Albanese stated of the eSafety actions. ‘That is primarily a standard sense place by the eSafety commissioner.’
‘What the eSafety Commissioner is doing is doing her job to guard the pursuits of Australians.
‘The concept that somebody would go to court docket for the proper to place up violent content material on a platform reveals how out of contact Mr Musk is.’
‘Social media must have social accountability with it. Mr Musk just isn’t exhibiting any.’
Requested whether or not the commissioner might be granted stronger powers or if entry to X in Australia needs to be minimize, the prime minister stated the federal government was taking a look at what measures might be taken.
‘Nobody needs censorship right here – what we would like, although, is the applying of a little bit of widespread sense so you do not present and propagate violence on-line,’ Mr Albanese stated.
The Opposition has backed harder legal guidelines to crackdown on graphic content material being shared on-line.
Whereas the eSafety Commissioner already had the facility to primarily block the social media web site in Australia by getting telcos to disclaim entry, it hadn’t proven any indicators of taking place that path but, Dr Nicholls stated.
Such a block would not be unprecedented after telcos proactively shut down entry to websites that disseminated video of the Christchurch bloodbath in 2019.
Whereas supporting free speech, Mr Musk was ‘useless incorrect’ on the stance about terror content material, Liberal frontbencher Simon Birmingham stated, whereas impartial senator Jacqui Lambie went additional and known as him a ‘social media knob’.
‘He’s dangerous – what he is doing to youngsters on the market and what he is doing to adults and the crap he places on the market on X… has gone far sufficient,’ she stated.
