Google and Meta targeted by Australia: RSF calls for a tax to fund journalism

On 28 April, the Australian Government unveiled a new bill, the News Bargaining Incentive (NBI), aimed at rebalancing the economic relationship between media outlets and platforms. The bill proposes applying a 2.25 per cent levy on the Australian revenue of major digital platforms if negotiations fail. According to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, the platforms chiefly targeted are Google, Meta and TikTok.

On paper, the mechanism is also intended to encourage platforms to negotiate with smaller organisations, rather than only major media conglomerates. Each dollar paid counts as 1.50 AUD in deductions when it goes to a major publisher and 1.70 AUD when it benefits a small or medium-sized publisher.

No agreement could be valued at more than 25 per cent of the total amount theoretically owed. This means that four agreements would be enough for platforms to avoid the levy while paying less than they would have owed under the tax.

The new bill can address the flaws of the previous system

The bill is intended to replace the current legal framework, the News Media Bargaining Code. In force since 2021, the Code already encourages platforms to establish commercial relationships with publishers or face fines. The results speak for themselves: by the end of 2022, the Treasury had recorded only 36 direct agreements between Google or Meta and publishers, covering around 146 news businesses, according to the Public Interest Journalism Initiative. This is a very low figure compared with the 2,864 professional media outlets counted by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) in its 2025 report. At the end of February 2024, Meta dealt a fatal blow to the system by announcing that it would not renew any of the agreements it had signed.

Facebook had already temporarily removed news from its services in Australia in 2021 in response to the bill, setting a precedent that was repeated in Canada in 2023, where the ban is still in effect. The News Bargaining Incentive Bill, the new version of the legislation, draws lessons from this pressure tactic and would now apply to all eligible platforms, whether or not they host news content. Banning news from a platform would therefore no longer allow its owner to escape the scope of the law.

RSF recommendations

The proposal protects the media and the public only partially, since platforms could still ban journalistic content and the fiscal mechanism proposed by the bill cannot guarantee the funding of a pluralistic media ecosystem. RSF therefore proposes two major revisions to the bill.

• First, the bill should introduce a "must-be-found" obligation for journalistic content, guaranteeing publishers the free circulation of their content on the services of their choice while also upholding citizens' right to reliable information. This mechanism would prevent platforms from banning news content altogether.

• Second, the threat of a levy should be transformed into a genuine tax to fund journalism. Funding for the country's media industry cannot be channelled through agreements negotiated directly by platforms whose business model is not based on the production of reliable news and information. A tax can address this problem, provided that the funds are distributed to media outlets that meet professional ethical standards. A certification system such as the Journalism Trust Initiative (JTI), launched by RSF and adopted by more than 2,000 media outlets in 119 countries, already provides such a basis.