The Australian
By James Dowling 8:54PM July 01, 2026
Social media experts say American policies, businesses and current events are jeopardising Australia’s social cohesion, with the antisemitism royal commission hearing recommendations for wholesale online reform at odds with the Trump administration.
The commission heard ambitious proposals for social media reform on Wednesday from four expert witnesses whose skills it had enlisted to produce reports on online antisemitism and measures to address it. Suggestions included a digital duty of care agreement, a mandatory licensing framework for tech platforms and reworked social media algorithms built to tamp down hateful content.
The policy plans, if taken up in the Antisemitism and Social Cohesion Royal Commission’s final recommendations, would challenge the Albanese government to go beyond its landmark social media ban and news media bargaining incentive by facing down global tech giants and their vocal advocate: US President Donald Trump.
Online Hate Prevention Institute chief executive Andre Oboler accused trillionaire Elon Musk of fuelling social media bigotry, both through his management of social media platform X and his own posting online, saying the site’s moderators were “difficult to work with” and influenced by Mr Musk’s own free speech absolutism.
“Elon Musk buying the platform and changing it from Twitter to X … led to about 80 per cent of the trust and safety staff being fired almost immediately,” Dr Oboler told the royal commission.
“There was a major change in that regard, but also a philosophical change where it went from a platform that was at least trying to improve safety to a platform that said: ‘No, we believe in absolute free speech’.
“A lot of people that have been removed from the platform prior to that were invited back on to it. The environment just became more and more toxic.”
He used a gesture Mr Musk made at an event for Mr Trump’s second inauguration, construed by many to be a Nazi salute, as an example.
“Elon Musk himself has amplified certain content that really promotes antisemitism and pushes hate,” Dr Oboler said.
“After Trump’s election, we saw the Nazi salute that he did at the event, so read it as you will, but there’s certainly a problem there that is being amplified and coming from someone with a huge degree of influence over the platform.”
Dr Oboler said algorithms were also “clustering Jewish people and antisemitic people together” because of how platforms prioritised user engagement, making it easier for bigots to reach their intended targets.
Institute for Strategic Dialogue researcher Hannah Rose said the assassination of American political commentator Charlie Kirk prompted a spike of antisemitism in Australia.
“This to me speaks to the relevance of international events to the Australian conflict,” she said. “Any user based in Australia can access any content globally, and so this isn’t necessarily based on national borders.
“This speaks to the importance of being able to operate globally in response to antisemitism, and international co-operation with other states who are facing similar issues.”
University of Sydney media analyst Terry Flew said Mr Trump’s re-election fostered a “very strong alliance between many of the leading tech companies and that presidency” which prompted social media companies to slash digital safeguards and hamper the safety of their Australian users.
“It’s certainly involved the dismantling of a range of mechanisms that had been applied within the companies,” Professor Flew said.
“We’re talking on the one hand about the regulation of businesses, and in many respects the onus on regulating businesses is not in itself contentious … but we’re also talking about regulating communication and regulating speech, and that takes us into more complex legal, philosophical and operational questions.”
A digital duty of care would act as an enforceable charter for good corporate citizenship among social media platforms, which they could also consult on. The federal government has been mulling a digital duty of care since the Rickard Review into the Online Safety Act recommended one in 2024.
“There may be capacity … to put some kind of legal teeth there, while at the same time promoting principles around social licence for platforms that are keen to work with governments,” Professor Flew said.
University of Sydney regulatory expert Robert Nicholls said a licensing scheme tied to the duty of care would hold platforms accountable under threat of being blocked in Australia.
He said every social media service or age-restricted social media platform should have to fill four criteria to be licensed: registering with the Australian Communications and Media Authority; nominating an Australian entity with a domestic address; filing a financial sufficiency certificate proving it could pay any penalties locally enforced; and the designation of a principal entity.
This, however, could risk infringing the US-Australia Free Trade Agreement which required Australia not to force US companies operating here to hold an Australian address.
Dr Nicholls said regulation of specific social media content could be tied to program algorithms, where suspected hate speech, restricted posts or “borderline material” could be variously tamped down by the platform.
“The fact that they’re using algorithmic amplification means that they also have the ability then to control it, and the basic control is stopping further sharing other than the direct sharing that’s done by the individual,” he said.
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