Government Criminalises ‘Fake News’ Intended to Cause Non-Trivial Harm

The government has introduced an offence to criminalise “fake news” as well as cyberflashing and epilepsy-trolling under the Online Safety Act. On Wednesday, the government announced that new offences under online spaces laws have kicked in “meaning criminals can face up to five years behind bars for their demeaning and dangerous actions.” It said that “abusers, trolls, and predators online now face a fleet of tough new jailable offences from today as offences for ‘cyberflashing,’ sending death threats, and ‘epilepsy-trolling’ are written into the statute book after the Online Safety Act gained Royal Assent.” A new “fake news” offence, a new false communications offence, will outlaw the intentional sending of false information that could cause “non-trivial psychological” or physical harm to users online....