This man can order TikTok and Facebook to take posts down - Singapore's online safety commissioner

Natasha Ann Zachariah (0:07)

Hi guys, are you familiar with the Online Safety Commission? It's a government agency that has powers to help victims of online harms get help faster should they be subjected to issues such as doxing or intimate image abuse.

Three months in, I want to find out how the commission has been tackling the reports that have come its way. Also, how is this now different from the reporting process that we had before? And will it ever be possible for the internet to be a safe space?

Welcome to The Usual Place, the weekly podcast where we have real conversations about the headlines. I'm Natasha, and today I'm chatting with the man who has the powers to tell the likes of Facebook, TikTok and X to deal with online harms ASAP, or there will be consequences. So, Francis, thank you for dropping by The Usual Place. A quick introduction about you. Now, you've had more than 25 years of experience in public sector legal roles, including as the Deputy Chief Prosecutor in the Crime Division of the Attorney General's Chambers. Now, you're the first Commissioner of Online Safety. It's a very big title. And I want to start with the fact that the OSC has started, it started operations at the end of June. Some Singaporeans might not be familiar with it yet. So, can you tell me a little bit about what the Commission does? Because I kind of gave a short introduction, but can you flesh it out about what this Commission does for Singaporeans?

Francis Ng (1:24)

Natasha, I'm really happy to be here with you today. So the Online Safety Commission is a dedicated government agency, the main purpose of which is to provide relief to victims who have suffered online harms.

Now, how this relief comes about is through removal of the harmful material from the online space. And we found that removal of the harmful material actually gives victims a lot more headspace. It makes them feel assured and regain their confidence that the material that was causing them so much distress is now no longer available for circulation. Now, we do this by issuing directions to platforms, to communicators, to administrators of online sites. And these directions actually have the effect of compelling the recipient to take action in relation to the direction. So it might be a direction, for example, to stop communicating certain material, to restrict an account, for example, or to refrain from posting material in the future.

Non-compliance with these directions is actually a criminal offense.

Natasha Ann Zachariah (2:27)

Which was interesting to me because I didn't know that I as a person could be told to take down some stuff that I put up on social media, right? But I want to find out, like, why is there a need to start a brand new commission instead of simply like beefing up existing powers? Like, what was the gap in the system before the OSC came into force?

Francis Ng (2:44)

So before the commission existed, there were different parts of the ecosystem that were dealing with such harmful material online. The police, for example, would investigate criminal offenses. So for example, if you put up an intimate image of someone, that would be an offense under the penal code, right? The police could investigate that offense, locate the person who posted the content, and maybe deal with him or her. But the police couldn't do anything directly to get the content removed from the Internet, right? At the same time, there were other pieces of legislation such as the Protection from Harassment Act. These actually allowed for civil remedies against people who were engaged in harassment, stalking or doxing. You could actually go to the courts to get a protection order, for example, against these people. But again, these remedies didn't deal directly with the content circulating on the Internet itself. So there was nothing essentially in place that allowed private citizens to go to platforms or to go to communicators directly and force them to take down and remove the content.

Hence the need for the Commission. The Commission is actually a step that empowers individuals to self-help.

They report online harms to the Commission. We take a look at the material that comes in. If it falls within the scope of one of the harms that we currently prioritize, we then take action by contacting the platforms or the communicators, in a sense, to get them to take down the content as soon as possible.

Natasha Ann Zachariah (4:12)

So, as I mentioned, the Commission started operations in June, at the end of June, right? So it's been... But within the first two months, the agency has had to deal with about 500 cases. Did it surprise you at the sheer amount of people reporting?