The Law Handbook 2024

740 Section 7: Consumers, contracts, the internet and copyright communications, including email. The key section of the RRT Act is section 8(1), which provides that: A person must not engage in conduct that incites ha- tred against, serious contempt for, or revulsion or se- vere ridicule of, that other person or class of persons. Complaints can be made to the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission (see ‘Contacts’ at the end of this chapter). For more information, see Chapter 11.1: Discrimination and human rights. Case example: Religious vilification Catch the Fire Ministries Inc v Islamic Council of Victoria Inc (2006) 15 VR 207; [2006] VSCA 284 The Islamic Council of Victoria lodged a complaint under the RRT Act about statements made by a Christian pastor from the Catch the Fire Ministries (‘ Ministries ’) at a seminar and in articles published online; the complainant claimed the pastor’s statements vilified Muslims. The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal ( VCAT ) upheld the complaint and ordered that corrective advertisements be published on the respondent’s website for a period of 12 months. The Ministries appealed VCAT’s decision and the appeal was upheld on the basis that VCAT applied an incorrect test in determining whether the RRT Act had been breached. However, the Court of Appeal confirmed that: • the order to publish corrective advertising was not beyond VCAT’s power under section 136 of the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 (Vic); and • section 8 was valid and did not burden the implied freedom of communication about government and political matters. Internet gambling The Australian Government regulates internet gambling. Access by Australian-based customers to certain forms of interactive gambling is prohibited (e.g. online casino-style games and live sports wagering). It is also an offence to provide particular forms of Australian-based interactive gambling to customers in specific countries. For more information about internet gambling, go to the Australian Communications Media Authority ( ACMA ) website (www.acma.gov.au) . Domain names and cyber-squatting Domain names (also called URLs) are unique web addresses. To establish a domain name, the name must be registered with the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers ( ICANN ). In Australia, ICANN contracts out its registration function to other corporations. ‘ Cyber-squatting ’ is where a person registers a domain name in which they have no legitimate interest, with a view to obtaining a profit from those with a genuine interest in the domain name. There is no specific anti-cyber-squatting legislation in Australia, but such actions may constitute trade mark infringement, ‘passing off’ (i.e. representing goods or services as your own, which are not) or may breach the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth). In Australia, cyber-squatting is usually dealt with under misleading or deceptive conduct, rather than trade mark infringement. Under Australian law, domain names are a licence, held by the person who registered the name (the registrant), under a contract with the authority in charge of managing and registering domain names. Because the registration of a domain name is an administrative action, the act of registration does not give the registrant any legal rights, other than the contractual right acquired by registration. This means that domain names are not owned but are contractual rights that are subject to terms and conditions as stipulated in the agreement for registration. The relevant policy is the Domain Administration Rules: Licensing, June 2023, published by the Australian Domain Name Administrator ( auDA ) (the regulator of the .au domain administration), which states (s 1.3): The objects of the auDA Rules are to ensure that a Licensing system is established which: 1. is transparent, responsive, accountable, accessible, and efficient; 2. improves the utility of the .au ccTLD for all Australians; 3. promotes consumer protection, fair trading and competition; 4. provides those protections necessary to maintain the integrity, stability, utility and public confidence in the .au ccTLD; 5. expresses licence terms and conditions in objective and not subjective terms;