Summary:
The United States embassy in Canberra published a formal response on 22 September 2026 to Australia's consultation on the Online Safety Amendment (Digital Duty of Care) Bill 2026, saying the draft would risk viewpoint-based censorship and could change what users see well beyond Australia. The filing asked Canberra to withdraw any plan to make platforms algorithmically suppress content on ambiguous government safety criteria, and left seven questions on the consultation record.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, asked in New York the same day about what a reporter called a "pretty hostile" statement, said he would always stand up for Australia's national interest. He said the bill was not about government control but about giving people back control over what they receive on their devices.
The exposure draft, published on 8 September, would place a legal duty on platforms to prevent foreseeable harm and would require them to offer users a way off algorithmic feeds. Consultation on that text closed at noon on the day Washington posted its response.
Detailed Report
1. Washington's Submission Lands as Consultation Closes
The United States government posted its views on the embassy website on 22 September as input to Australia's public consultation on the exposure draft. "Preserving a free, open internet and protecting freedom of expression online," it said, "are top priorities for the Trump Administration." It set out an objective of ensuring any resulting measures respect freedom of expression and fair competition — and of preventing design mandates or litigation risks that would unduly burden American companies.
The note landed on the day submissions closed, and on a day Albanese was in New York, where he told a United Nations meeting that Australia was introducing My Feed, My Way to put choice over the algorithm back in users' hands. The draft itself would require online services to take reasonable steps to keep users safe, and would make platforms offer Australians a feed that is not driven by recommendations. For further information on the bill, see Australia Drafts Online Duty of Care, Critics Warn of Censorship.
2. Washington's Warning: Vague Harm, Pre-emptive Censorship
The United States said it had serious concerns about Australia's stated goal of mandating broad duty-of-care requirements that dictate how platforms manage content and users' feeds. The first concern was how the Australian government, or the communications minister, would designate what constitutes "foreseeable harm." The second was any resulting requirement that platforms alter their algorithmic systems to suppress expression that should be protected in order to avoid liability, or any approach that would likely result in platforms defaulting to pre-emptive censorship to avoid that risk.
It was particularly concerned by mandates that would let regulators impose rigid, one-size-fits-all design rules, such as forced chronological feeds or opt-in recommendation systems.
"A framework that empowers governments to enforce vague definitions of 'harm' risks becoming a mechanism for viewpoint-based censorship, as platforms will be incentivized to over-moderate speech that should be protected to avoid regulatory penalties," the filing said. "Such a framework also risks reducing the reach of independent journalists or other voices whose content touches on sensitive or controversial topics that platforms may preemptively demote to comply with overbroad safety mandates."
It asked Australia to say how "harm" and "risks" would be determined, whether any standard definitions would be used, and by whom, and to ensure those definitions did not encroach on protected speech.
"If Australia compels platforms to aggressively filter content in algorithmic feeds to satisfy a government mandate, and such filtering draws in protected speech, the effect on a disfavored speaker or media source's reach would not be meaningfully different than outright removal," it said. "The U.S. government would likely consider such a measure as facilitating censorship."
It asked Australia to withdraw any plans to mandate that platforms algorithmically suppress content based on ambiguous government-defined safety criteria. It also noted that the Online Safety Act 2021 already affords protections against unprotected, illegal content and grants the eSafety Commissioner significant takedown powers. Layering mandated algorithmic and duty-of-care requirements on top of those mechanisms, it said, risks regulatory overlap and unpredictability.
3. Beyond Australia: Global Feeds, Global Effects
The filing said a digital duty-of-care regime may have significant effects beyond Australian borders. The large majority of social media and video-sharing platforms that would be affected are United States-headquartered companies, operating substantially on United States soil and serving American users alongside Australian ones.
Mandated platform design features, especially when applied to algorithms, could shape what users everywhere — including Americans — see, say and hear, because platforms build and deploy product features globally rather than market by market. Forced design changes to mitigate Australia-specific risks, Washington said, could produce systemic changes that affect how users around the world experience these platforms and reach audiences.
"The U.S. government has made clear its opposition to foreign measures that result in extraterritorial censorship of protected speech by Americans online."
If other jurisdictions adopted their own, potentially conflicting, duty-of-care mandates, platforms could face incompatible design requirements that are not technically or commercially scalable to run in parallel — pressure, the filing warned, toward the most restrictive jurisdiction's rules winning out everywhere.
Depending on how the regime is implemented, it also raised concerns about fair competition, market access and trade treatment for American companies, independent media and content creators. Regulations that impose disproportionate compliance burdens on American companies relative to competitors, or that apply unevenly across similar services, "will invariably raise concerns."
4. Seven Questions on the Consultation Record
The submission closed with seven questions the United States asked the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications, Sport and the Arts to place on the consultation record.
· How will duty-of-care risk assessments and feature requirements accommodate platform-specific architectures, rather than imposing blanket mandates such as forced chronological feeds?
· What specific criteria will determine whether a piece of content or a platform feature constitutes a "foreseeable harm"? Who will make that determination, and will there be a process for users or platforms to appeal?
· How will the government respond to industry warnings that the measures could downgrade visibility and stifle organic growth for creators and independent journalists under overly aggressive "safety" filters?
· How will platforms be determined to fall within scope and become subject to the most stringent duty-of-care obligations?
· What role will third-party organisations or the eSafety Commissioner play in enforcement?
· What safeguards will ensure the biases and preferences of Australian officials and regulators do not influence platform design in ways that disadvantage independent or minority-viewpoint speech?
· How will commercially sensitive data and privacy be protected through enforcement of the digital duty of care, including in granting researcher access?
It also urged Australia to give companies and individual content creators more time.
5. Albanese: National Interest, Not Government Control
A reporter in New York put the embassy note to Albanese as a "pretty hostile" statement, on content and on timing, and asked whether he was worried about the intent the United States was showing.
"I'll always stand up for Australia's national interest and the digital duty of care is something that we've foreshadowed for some period of time," he said. "It's not about government control. It's about giving people back control over what they receive on their devices, which is why it is framed in that way."
He turned to the bill itself. The government had released an exposure draft, he said, and had not even introduced the legislation before the parliament.
"We'll engage constructively. I would hope that the whole of parliament, as I said when we announced the legislation, I hope the whole of the parliament supports it. This should not be a partisan issue. This is about giving power back to Australians rather than big global tech companies."
Conclusion
Washington asked Australia to withdraw a suppression mandate, to say who would define harm, and left seven questions on the consultation record. Albanese answered with national interest and user control, and noted that the text is still an exposure draft. As of publication, no departmental reply to the United States' questions had been posted.