Recommendation 16

The Commonwealth and state and territory governments to undertake an immediate audit of how DFSV perpetrators are weaponising government systems, and to respond to these findings. This audit and subsequent plans for reform should be informed by Safety by Design principles.

The Commonwealth Government should build on work that is already underway and prioritise systems where significant harm is occurring, such as: family law, child support, immigration, and taxation.

Update as at 28 November 2025

On 6 September 2024, following National Cabinet, the Prime Minister announced the Australian Government would immediately commence an audit of key Commonwealth systems to identify areas where they are being weaponised by perpetrators of family and domestic violence.

The audit, overseen by a Secretaries Working Group on Gender-Based Violence, is an ongoing mechanism to identify and address weaponisation of Commonwealth systems by perpetrators of family and domestic violence.

As an immediate response to the audit, the Australian Government has committed to embed safety in government systems and close financial abuse loopholes in the superannuation, tax and corporate, and social security systems. The government committed to consult on changes to tax and social security law so that perpetrators, not victim-survivors, are accountable for debts they accrue through financial abuse.

Further work is being done to consider how to strengthen the child support system against weaponisation, and to apply safety by design principles in systems design, operation and reform.

The Australian Government introduced the Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Technical Changes No. 2) Bill 2025 into the House of Representatives on 4 September 2025. The Bill allows Services Australia to better account for circumstances like coercion or financial abuse when administering the special circumstances debt waiver. This builds on the election commitment to embed safety in Commonwealth systems and ensure the social security system cannot be weaponised against women experiencing violence.

Further, from 10 June 2025, the Family Law Amendment Act 2024 reforms commenced, clarifying that the economic impacts of family violence are relevant to the division of property after separation. The Act also introduced a new power for court to prevent access to sensitive health care information, or information from specialist family and sexual violence services, where this would be harmful to children or a party.

The New South Wales Government’s Office of the Women’s Safety Commissioner is undertaking a program of work to prevent the misuse of NSW Government products and services by perpetrators of domestic and family violence. The Office engaged Flequity Ventures to undertake the first phase of the project, which sought to understand whether and how NSW Government products and services are at risk of being weaponised in this context. Phase two of the project involves building the capability of NSW Government agencies to prevent this risk of harm by embedding ‘Safety by Design’ in relevant policy and program development. This work will continue into 2026.

Recommendation 17

The Commonwealth and state and territory governments to work with industries that are well positioned to prevent and reduce DFSV, including homicide, with a focus on alcohol and gambling industries, in addition to media and pornography. This includes reviewing and strengthening alcohol and gambling regulatory environments to prioritise the prevention of gender-based violence. This should include:

1. adopting clear primary objectives in state and territory liquor regulatory regimes to prevent gender-based violence, alongside existing objectives around alcohol harm reduction (states and territories);
2. restrictions on alcohol sales, delivery timeframes (states and territories) and advertising (Commonwealth and states and territories);
3. stronger restrictions leading to a total ban on advertising of gambling (Commonwealth and states and territories);
4. examining the density of electronic gaming machines, and use of online gambling, in relation to the prevalence of DFSV across different populations and communities (Commonwealth and states and territories);
5. establishing and embedding national standards for media reporting on gender-based violence (Commonwealth); and
6. ensuring the age-verification pilot for online pornography tests both the technology, and how age verification assurance systems will be implemented, including the participation of the major technology platforms used by Australian children

Further, the Review recommends that the Commonwealth Government work with the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education (FARE) and other organisations on a framework to ensure the development of an integrated and focused effort to address the role of alcohol in DFSV.

Update as at 28 November 2025

On 6 September 2024, National Cabinet agreed to a package of practical next steps, including efforts to address the role that systems and harmful industries play in exacerbating violence. This includes:

• States and territories reviewing alcohol laws and the impact on FDSV, with the Council for the Australian Federation (CAF) to report back to National Cabinet on progress by the end of 2025. CAF will be reporting to National Cabinet on progress separately which is not captured in this implementation update.
• The Australian Government providing funding to the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education to update the National framework for action to prevent alcohol-related family violence ($1 million).

The Australian Government amended the Online Safety Act 2021 to introduce a social media minimum age framework in late 2024, which will take effect from 10 December 2025. Under this legislation, age-restricted social media platforms must take reasonable steps to prevent Australians under 16 from having social media accounts, with a view to protecting young people from the harms associate with social media use. In August 2025, the Australian Government published a final report of the independent Age Assurance Technology Trial, which found age assurance technology is effective in protecting young Australians from explicit and age-inappropriate content online.

The Australian Capital Territory Government has tabled legislation, the Liquor Amendment Bill 2025, that will implement a 10am-10pm delivery restriction, and a two-hour safety pause between the sale and delivery of alcohol. The Bill will also make it an offence to deliver alcohol to a person under 18 years old, to leave a delivery of alcohol unattended, and to deliver to people who are intoxicated. The Bill identifies intoxication late at night is a significant contributor to domestic, family and sexual violence.

The South Australian Government has developed and consulted on a draft bill, in response to a review of the Liquor Licensing Act (1997) that would implement reforms covering limits on online sale and delivery of alcohol, amendment of delivery times and a proposal to make the prevention of gendered violence a paramount objective of the Act.

Through the Women’s Safety Package announced by the Victorian Government in 2024, mandatory training will be added to Victoria’s Responsible Service of Alcohol training requirements, teaching staff how to identify and prevent sexual assault and harassment in venues. 

The Western Australian Government is undertaking a wholesale review of the state’s gambling laws. A consultation paper was released on 17 October 2025 inviting submissions by 12 December 2025. The review includes consideration of options for the regulation of gambling advertising.

Recommendation 18

The Commonwealth Government to continue to support the eSafety Commissioner to undertake increasingly complex work preventing gender-based violence, which includes working with the technology industry on the improvement of policies, practices and accountability.

Update as at 28 November 2025

At the National Cabinet meeting on 1 May 2024, the Commonwealth Government announced it will deliver a range of new measures to tackle factors that exacerbate violence against women, such as violent online pornography, and misogynistic content targeting children and young people. This commitment was reiterated at the 6 September 2024 National Cabinet meeting.

On 8 November 2024, National Cabinet agreed to the Commonwealth legislating a minimum age of 16 to access social media. The Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Act 2024, requires social media platforms to prevent Australians under the age of 16 years from having social media accounts through age verification of users. The requirements will come into effect on 10 December 2025.

The Australian Government made the online dating industry code subject to enforcement on 1 April 2025 after a six month voluntary period. The code establishes safeguards to reduce the risk of online enabled harm to users of dating services operating in Australia.

On 30 July 2025, the eSafety Commissioner registered three new industry codes submitted by the online industry, creating safeguards to protect children from exposure to pornography, violent content, and themes of suicide, self-harm and disordered eating. Once in place, the new codes support efforts dealing with the highest-harm online material, such as child sexual abuse material and pro-terror content.

The eSafety Commissioner awarded $3.5 million to 10 new projects under the Commonwealth’s $10 million Preventing Tech‑based Abuse of Women Grants Program. This includes a dedicated First Nations funding stream and targeted investments for the prevention of abuse of women with disability, CALD women, and LGBTQIA+ women. Six of the projects will directly engage boys and men.

The South Australian Government tabled the Summary Offences (Humiliating, Degrading and Invasive Depictions) Amendment Act 2025 which complements the existing image-based offences in Part 5A of the Summary Offences Act 1953. It does this by establishing new offences to target the creation, distribution and threat to distribute humiliating, degrading or invasive depictions of a simulated person that have been wholly generated by Artificial Intelligence or other digital technology.