The regulations that give effect to the operation of the Films and Publications Amendment (FPA) Act have been gazetted, says the Film and Publication Board (FPB).
The Films and Publications Regulations 2022, referred to as regulations, serve as an instrument to implement the Amendment Act that came into operation on 1 March, according to the FPB.
In a statement, the FPB says the Act expands its mandate from a traditional classification authority to a regulator of content that is distributed on digital platforms.
Zama Mkosi, chairperson of FPB Council, states: “The publication of the regulations has been eagerly anticipated and now provides the FPB with the ability to fully execute its responsibilities as articulated in the amendments to the Act.
“We commend the minister for this milestone delivered in terms of section 31A of the Films & Publications Act.”
An entity of the Department of Communications and Digital Technologies, the FPB is the official content-classification authority for films, games, certain publications, and more recently, social media and online content.
The FPA Act – dubbed the 'Internet Censorship Act’ – was proclaimed by president Cyril Ramaphosa in March, after it was signed into law in 2019.
Its operationalisation, however, was put in abeyance to allow the FPB to adequately prepare and undertake certain critical regulatory exercises as required by the Act.
The regulations seek to make provision for online content distribution, and allow the FPB to be the final arbiter to determine what forms of expression are allowed or not allowed online.
It stipulates that commercial online content distributors have to submit content available on their platforms for classification by the FPB, or enter into individual exemption agreements with the FPB
In the case of government, it has stated that the changes to the FPA Act seek to modernise laws that protect the South African public from exposure to prohibited content distributed online, as well as exposure of children to harmful digital content.
The FPB statement notes that the regulations provide greater clarity as to how it regulates commercial online distributors, to name a few.
It further creates the mechanism for the public to report cases of unclassified, prohibited, or potential prohibited content that is distributed online, cases of the distribution of private sexual photographs and films without the consent of the individual that appears in such, and cases of distributing films and photographs depicting sexual violence and violence against children.
“As the FPB, we will in the next few weeks announce the Enforcement Committee and Appeals Tribunal who will help us in the enforcement of these regulations to ensure that the South Africa citizens; particularly children, youth, women and people with disabilities, are duly protected from unprecedented growing online harms,” concludes Mkosi.
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