South Australia moves to outlaw cyber bullying

Posting violent or other degrading images on the internet will become an offence under proposed South Australian laws.

Attorney-General John Rau said the state's proposed legislation, to be introduced this year, would be the first of its kind in Australia.

It will make it an offence to knowingly take or publish humiliating, demeaning or degrading images of another person without their consent.

Mr Rau said it was designed to tackle thugs who filmed assaults and then posted them on the internet.

The move follows the appearance of a viral video on YouTube showing a student in an Australian school playground tormenting another boy and then being picked up and violently thrown on the ground by the victim.

"The government wants to attack this disgusting fad of thugs engineering and filming violent and humiliating acts and posting the images to websites," Mr Rau said on Wednesday.

"This behaviour is so disturbing and potentially damaging to the victims that I believe the creators of these images should be subject to severe penalties, including jail sentences.

"The government wants to make it very clear that if a person participates in any way in an act of this sort, then the consequences will be severe."

Mr Rau said the onus would be on the person charged to prove that they had a legitimate purpose for capturing the images, other than humiliating, degrading or demeaning the victim.

The proposed laws would cover anyone involved in the process of deliberately filming and publishing the images.

"For example, if you knowingly allow someone to use your computer or phone to upload the images, you could be covered by the laws," Mr Rau said.

"If you knowingly participate in someone's humiliation while someone else films it, you could also find yourself charged with a serious offence."

But opposition justice spokesman Stephen Wade said the government's proposals lacked detail.

"We have no indication of how this initiative will be policed or how we can avoid people being unfairly caught by the legislation," Mr Wade said.

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