Dating platforms provide direct access to people seeking relationships, but current safeguards do not adequately protect users from impersonation, fake accounts, repeat account creation or people who present an established risk of domestic, sexual or intimate partner violence.

Being banned from one account may not prevent somebody from returning under another name, email address, telephone number or device. A safety system based only on criminal convictions would also miss many serious cases because domestic and sexual violence often does not result in prosecution or conviction.

I am asking residents of Newcastle, Lake Macquarie, the Hunter and surrounding Australian communities to support government consideration of an Australian Online Dating Safety and Intimate Partner Protection Framework.

The proposal calls for:

• Private identity and liveness verification before a dating profile can become visible, match with users or send messages.

• Verification covering all new, existing, dormant and reactivated accounts—not only profiles created after the law commences.

• Fresh verification and a restriction-status check whenever an account is created, recovered or reactivated.

• Time-limited Dating Safety Restriction Orders for people independently assessed by a court as presenting a serious risk to future intimate partners.

• A pathway that does not depend entirely on imprisonment or criminal conviction.

• Consideration of reliable evidence from police, courts and accredited specialist domestic and family violence services, including verified patterns of behaviour.

• Urgent interim restrictions where there is evidence of an immediate serious risk.

• Strong procedural safeguards, independent decision-making and review and appeal rights. A single untested allegation should not, by itself, result in a long-term final restriction.

• A secure, non-public government system that tells dating platforms only whether an active restriction exists. Victim-survivor identities, reports and personal information must never be provided to dating platforms or made public.

• Strict protections for identity and biometric information, including accessible alternatives for people who cannot complete facial verification.

• Enforcement across participating dating platforms so that changing an email address, telephone number, device or username cannot defeat an active restriction.

This is an expression of community support that will be presented to local NSW and Commonwealth representatives with the complete policy proposal. It is intended to demonstrate that our community wants governments to seriously investigate and consult on these reforms.

By signing, you are saying:

“I support government consideration of enforceable identity-verification standards and a fair, evidence-based Dating Safety Restriction Order scheme to better protect people from foreseeable domestic, sexual and intimate partner violence.”

You do not need to disclose any personal experience of violence to sign this petition. Please do not identify an alleged perpetrator or publish personal allegations in the comments.

We should not have to wait for another person to be harmed before information already known within our domestic violence system becomes relevant to their safety.