ABC News, 30 June 2026

ABC 24 - ABC News Afternoons

Transcript:

The Royal Commission on Anti-Semitism and Social Cohesion has been told that social media companies have been grossly inadequate in responding to online posts targeting witnesses who've appeared at the inquiry.

Inquiry has been told of new analysis showing that at least 26 witnesses who appeared in the first hearing block have received abuse online or even threats of violence. Gavin Coote is following the hearings and is with me in the studio.

Hi Gavin, so can you tell us about this analysis?

Well Roz, the Dor Foundation, which is a not-for-profit that was founded, set up by the former Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, has been doing an analysis of the volume of hate and abuse that's been levelled at witnesses.

In the second hearing block, the Royal Commissioner, Virginia Bell, issued a stern warning about threats directed towards people who had given evidence at the inquiry. And now the Doar Foundation has put a number to that.

They did a sample, found quite a large volume, but found this sample of about 275 offensive posts. And as part of an exercise, they found what sort of response did they receive from the social media platform, the companies, when these were flagged.

Now, of those, that sample of 275 posts, five of them were removed from Facebook, another 20 were removed from X, which is formerly Twitter, and some of the TikTok posts, three or four TikTok posts were removed, but all eight YouTube posts that were flagged as being hateful or offensive remained online.

Now, Tali Blickblau is the CEO of the Doar Foundation, she told the inquiry some material was not removed but despite these, they flagged it a number of times, and some of these posts included comments calling for the death of all Jews.

Here she is.

Tahli Blicblau

The exercise that we undertook in relation to reporting these posts and comments to the platforms demonstrates a grossly inadequate response. It's clear that the platform response is entirely out of step with normal communal expectations of how people should treat one another.

And I think it's fair to say that either the legislation or policies are not effective or are not being effectively enforced.

The Royal Commission on AntiSemitism and Social Cohesion has been told that social media companies have been grossly inadequate in responding to online posts targeting witnesses who've appeared at the inquiry. Inquiry has been told of new analysis showing that at least 26 witnesses who appeared in the first hearing block have received abuse online or even threats of violence. Gavin Coote is following the hearings and is with me in the studio.