Australia’s online safety regulator warned Twitter of a likely increase in online hate targeting Indigenous Australians in the lead-up to the voice to parliament referendum but the platform did not substantially respond to its concerns, a freedom of information request reveals.
The eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, sent a legal notice to X – the rebranded Twitter – in June demanding an explanation over what she said was an increase in complaints since Elon Musk’s takeover of the company in October last year. She said there had been more complaints about online hate on Twitter in the past year than any other platform.
Guardian Australia sought communications between X and the eSafety under FoI laws. The request revealed that in email communications in March, an eSafety cyber abuse manager contacted a then-Twitter staff member warning that the upcoming referendum on an Indigenous voice to parliament was likely to increase hate on the platform.
“We are preparing for the likely increase in online hate speech that will be directed towards First Nations people as a result of the upcoming voice to parliament referendum,” the email said. “We are keen to chat with you about some of the unique forms of hate speech experienced by our First Nations people and provide some Australian contextual information to assist in identifying hate speech targeting our First Nations people.”
The email was then followed up two weeks later with a list of the identified types of hate speech, including racial slurs, hate terms and derogatory language used to target Indigenous Australians – the list was excluded from release under FoI exceptions on the grounds it would reveal eSafety’s methods for detecting people evading or breaching the Online Safety Act.
No replies from Twitter were included and Guardian Australia confirmed that the company had not substantially responded to the concerns raised by the regulator. The office appears to have not raised any other issues of hate speech or bullying with X – outside of personal reports for takedowns – in the time since Musk took over.
X was contacted for comment.
In June when Inman Grant issued the formal notice to X asking for an explanation on on how it tackles hate speech, she said the company had “dropped the ball on tackling hate”. The formal notice is separate to the warning about possible hate speech linked to the voice referendum and was blocked from release under FoI.
“Twitter has always been fiery in terms of discourse, but it’s turned into an absolute bin fire,” she told the ABC at the time.
She said Indigenous Australians or people who are disabled or identify as LGBTQ+ experience online hate at double the rate of the rest of the population.
X had 28 days to respond to the legal notice or face fines of up to nearly $700,000 per day, but was granted an extension by eSafety and has now responded, a spokesperson said.
The spokesperson said “eSafety is considering the information received” and that “eSafety intends to publish a summary of Twitter/X’s response to promote transparency and accountability.”
