HONG KONG — Singapore introduced draft legislation on Monday that it said would combat false or misleading information on the internet, but critics said the measure could be used as a cudgel against the government’s critics.
The legislation, called the Protection From Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Bill, would require websites to run corrections alongside “online falsehoods” and would “cut off profits” of sites that spread misinformation, among other measures, according to the Ministry of Law.
The bill is widely expected to become law in the coming weeks because it has support from Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s People’s Action Party, which has a supermajority in Parliament.
“This bill targets falsehoods, not free speech,” the Ministry of Law said in a statement outlining the legislation. “It will help ensure online falsehoods do not drown out authentic speech and ideas, and undermine democratic processes and society.”
But human rights advocates said they feared that the bill, which would give government ministers wide-ranging powers to fight misinformation that damaged the public interest, would grant the authorities too much leeway to decide what was true or false.
The bill defines the public interest broadly, saying that ministers could intervene to prevent “a diminution of public confidence” in the government’s performance or the “incitement of feelings of enmity, hatred or ill will between different groups of persons,” among other threats.
Kirsten Han, a Singaporean journalist and activist, described the legislation as “worryingly broad.”
“The bill gives ministers so much power and discretion — any minister can direct individuals or websites to post corrections or take down content, or order access to content to be blocked, and these orders have to be complied with first, even if one is going to appeal the direction in the courts,” Ms. Han said in an email.
The Ministry of Law said the bill did not apply to “opinions, criticisms, satire or parody,” only to falsehoods that threatened the public interest. According to a draft of the bill, punishments for some violations could include fines of up to about $44,000 and a prison term of up to six years for individuals, or fines of up to about $738,000 in “any other case.”
Critics say the bill could put a wide range of online publishers in legal jeopardy in Singapore, including foreign media organizations.
The “public interest” definitions are so vague, they add, that the legislation could be weaponized to target the government’s critics. Similar laws have been used by authoritarian governments around Southeast Asia.
“You’re basically giving the autocrats another weapon to restrict speech, and speech is pretty restricted in the region already,” said Phil Robertson, the deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch.
Singapore holds elections, but there has never been a change of power as a result, and the government has long exerted control over the domestic news media through defamation suits.
The advocacy group Reporters Without Borders ranks Singapore 151st of 180 countries in its Press Freedom Index, three places behind Russia.
The draft legislation is hardly the first of its kind. Governments including those of Russia and of South Korea have recently put so-called false news in their cross hairs. Restrictions on online communication are also under discussion in Australia and New Zealand, as both countries try to address popular outrage over the massacre last month of 50 people at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand.
In statements on Monday, press officers for Google and Twitter said the companies were still reviewing the bill.
“Misinformation is a significant challenge, and one that we are working hard to address,” said Chris Brummitt, a Google spokesman. “We will study the bill to determine our next steps, and urge the government to allow for a full and transparent public consultation on the proposed legislation.”
Simon Milner, Facebook’s vice president for public policy in the Asia-Pacific region, said in a statement that the social network supported regulation that “strikes the right balance between reducing harm while protecting people’s rights to meaningful speech.”
“We are, however, concerned with aspects of the law that grant broad powers to the Singapore executive branch to compel us to remove content they deem to be false and proactively push a government notification to users,” he added.
Companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter were once lauded for leading free speech and public discourse into a new age. Now, they are more likely to be blamed for providing an outlet for misinformation.
As skepticism has risen, the platforms have taken measures to combat bogus or harmful information, with varying degrees of success. They have stepped up efforts to police content and enlisted the help of outside organizations to fact-check news articles and videos. They have tried to empower trusted publishers, such as traditional news agencies, to improve the overall quality of the information that users are shown.
But controversies have continued to erupt. And even for the internet companies, it may now be easier to ask lawmakers to lay down guidelines for content. That way, the companies can deflect the blame if the policies cause dissatisfaction.
In an op-ed over the weekend in The Washington Post, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s chief executive, made a case for regulating his platform, calling for “a more active role for governments and regulators.”
“We need a more standardized approach,” Mr. Zuckerberg wrote. “Regulation could set baselines for what’s prohibited and require companies to build systems for keeping harmful content to a bare minimum.”
On Monday, Jeff Paine, the managing director of the Asia Internet Coalition — whose members include Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, Twitter and other technology firms — said the group supported Singapore’s efforts to protect harmony, social cohesion, and the integrity of the country’s institutions and political processes.
But Mr. Paine said the group worried that the bill “gives the Singapore government full discretion over what is considered true or false.”
“As the most far-reaching legislation of its kind to date, this level of overreach poses significant risks to freedom of expression and speech, and could have severe ramifications both in Singapore and around the world,” he said.
Mr. Lee, the prime minister, previewed the false news bill in a speech last week at a gala dinner celebrating the 20th anniversary of the founding of Channel NewsAsia, a Singapore-based outlet.
Mr. Lee told guests that the city-state was “particularly vulnerable” to false news because it was a multiracial, multiethnic society with “enduring fault lines that can be easily exploited.”
Channel NewsAsia covered Mr. Lee’s remarks, but without mentioning that the government’s campaigns against misinformation have generated criticism from free speech advocates.
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