Will Labour take on the oligarchs?

David Parker gave a big foreign policy speech this morning, reiterating the party's support for an independent (rather than boot-licking) foreign policy. Most of which was pretty orthodox - international law good, war bad, trade good, not interested in AUKUS, and wanting a demilitarised South Pacific (an area which presumably excludes Australia). But at the end, Parker strayed off foreign policy to talk about the world's big problems. And he identified two: gross inequality, and techbro oligarchs spreading misinformation:

The scourge of irresponsible social media, megalomaniacal tax avoiding tech barons, and irresponsible internet service providers is on my list of the important.

I have a view that we in the west have made a fundamental error in providing what is in effect an exclusion of liability for third party content.

He's not just talking about classic "misinformation" (whether state driven or not), but also defamation, threats, scams, and every other online evil. The current exclusion of liability means internet platforms face little incentive to police this (and every incentive to push them using their algorithms where it boosts "engagement"). Parker's solution is to remove that exclusion, make platforms liable, and "[l]eave it to the Courts to work out the balance between freedom of expression and the duty not to sell a harmful product."

Parker points out that we can use liability limits and safe harbours to encourage platforms to take active steps to remove harmful content. We already do this under the Films, Videos, and Publications Act to encourage platforms to remove objectionable content, and under the Harmful Digital Communications Act to encourage them to deal with complaints about harmful content. We could use similar means for scams.

All of this seems perfectly reasonable. Newspapers are liable, through the courts, Media Council, and Advertising Standards Authority, for what they choose to publish or allow to be published. There seems to be no reason why Facebook, YouTube, or XChan should be immune. Especially when they are making what are effectively editorial choices through their algorithms and moderation policies to highlight or bury, allow or deny certain content. Unlike the postal service or the phone company (which is where the exclusion originated), they're not just a dumb pipe. Treating them as one is causing definite harm, and its time the government put a stop to it.

...and while they're at it, they should put a stop to their systematic tax-cheating and lawlessness as well.