This illustrates a critique of online justice—that innocent civilians can be wrongfully accused and punished online. This was similarly seen in the “armchair investigation” of the Boston bombings by Reddit users who falsely accused an innocent individual of being the offender, resulting in harassment and abuse directed towards the individual accused and their family.

However, while trial by social media poses risks such as false accusations, it can also be a tool to protect victims of crime. For instance, research shows that women are increasingly drawing on their digital social networks to  name  and  shame  the  perpetrators  of  gender-based violence to successfully hold perpetrators accountable.

Certain online behaviours like sending offensive messages or posting malicious misinformation can be criminally charged. However, for an online post to be considered adult cyber abuse, it must be covered by the definition in the Online Safety Act, which reserves the term for extreme abusive material posted with the goal of inflicting significant harm on a person. The article suggests that due to the rigorous criteria needed to define adult cyber abuse, and the fact that Australia’s eSafety Commissioner cannot make criminal prosecutions, it is unlikely that X users will be held accountable for defamation and spreading misinformation. 

Therefore, there is a need for social media companies, such as X, to play a more proactive role in deterring uncorroborated instances of viral justice, which occurs when a viral online post is viewed and shared by a large number of users. A more rigorous and formal fact-checking system is needed to prevent false accusations that can be detrimental for an individual, while still allowing social media to foster a space for engagement with positive motivations for online justice such as awareness, activism, evidence gathering, and demanding formal justice.

This case also demonstrates how new technology makes cybercrime easier to commit. Apps like Signal and Telegram, which were used by the perpetrator, make such crimes more widespread due to the fact that they can be easily accessed, allow offenders to target numerous victims quickly, require little technical skill to operate, and allow cybercriminals to maintain anonymity. 

What is notable about this case is that the defence lawyer applied for a suppression order to prevent publicising the perpetrator's identity in order to ensure a non-prejudiced trial without interference from social media discourse. This illustrates how informal justice practices can obstruct a just application of criminal law proceedings. 

The defence lawyer appears to be avoiding both digilantism and a trial by media scenario. Digilantism occurs when individuals or groups outside of the legal system address alleged crimes by exposing wrongdoings, seeking justice, or holding perpetrators accountable instead of relying on official legal avenues, often through social media and online platforms. Similarly, trial by media refers to when the media fosters a presumption of an accused perpetrator’s guilt before or after the case has been tried in court. Given the nature of this crime, it is likely that publicising the perpetrator’s name would provoke digilantes and social media discourses.

While publicising a sex-offender’s identity is in the public interest after conviction, the risk of informal online justice can have some negative implications for victims during and before the trial. For example, informal justice can hinder the formal legal process, result in a loss of control over narratives and disclosures related to the case, and result in the story being discussed in unintended ways, such as by including conversations regarding the race and sexuality of the perpetrator. Ultimately, all of these can prevent swift and effective justice for the victim. 

According to subcultural theories of crime, the internet enables the creation of new subcultures that allow people to share a set of values and beliefs that are in  response to or in opposition with the broader culture. The subcultural theory of crime suggests that hacking subcultures allow individuals to form new bonds through hacking and earn status within the subculture by demonstrating their technical skills and knowledge. Similarly, social learning theories can explain why hacking groups such as EMBARGO may exist. According to social learning theories, individuals learn criminal behaviour through interactions with peers, which expose them to attitudes and beliefs that either support or discourage criminality. Under this theory, the behaviours of individuals are also influenced by anticipated rewards and punishments and attitudes and beliefs are reinforced by observing and imitating criminal behaviour. According to these theories, it can be speculated that within EMBARGO, various hackers continuously learn from each other to reinforce their belief system and encourage further criminal attitudes that lead to successful large-scale cyber attacks. This can also be a potential explanation for why cyber attacks are on the rise in Australia, compromising millions of people’s data. 

Following the Optus breach, Australia has considered banning organisations from making ransomware payments and enacted new legislation that significantly increased the penalties that organisations must pay for serious and repeated breaches of customer data. However, these responses fail to be effectively proactive when dealing with cybercrime. There is a need for more funding into approaches focused on designing out cybercrime that increases the effort required to commit a cybercrime and reduces the rewards for hackers. Similarly, more resources allocated to addressing the policing challenge of training officers to understand, investigate, and being up-to-date on new trends and skills can also help with proactively addressing this problem. 

According to the concept of the digital drift, people can easily drift into and out of cyber crime and delinquency due to the nature of digital platforms that make certain delinquent behaviours more accessible. This is especially prevalent on social media where users can interact with each other under anonymous profiles. 

Statistics show that minorities such as members of the LGBTQ+ community, as seen in this case, are at a higher risk of experiencing online abuse. This trend can be explored through routine activity theory. According to this theory, a crime occurs when there is a motivated offender, a suitable target, and a lack of capable supervision. It can be argued that the digital drift enables motivated offenders by allowing people who would not otherwise engage in bullying, to do it digitally on social media. With relevance to this case, the transgender victim served as a vulnerable target due to their non-conforming gender identity. Additionally, due to the digital setting of online harassment, there is also a lack of capable guardianship which further enables cyber bullying. 

This case also demonstrates how online subcultures can form on social media to perpetuate digital harms. Given the fact that the original X user has a prominent following on the platform and is known for being anti-trans, it is not surprising that the victim in this case experienced further bullying. In this case, the anti-trans user’s account served as a hub for other individuals who share transphobic and homophobic beliefs to reinforce and encourage each other’s discriminatory behaviour. 

This case also illustrates the jurisdictional challenges that occur when policing digital harms, as X is legally challenging the order from Australia's internet regulator that the tweet must be taken down so as to not infringe on the X user’s freedom of speech. Ultimately, this is a challenge that occurs when policing digital harms on social media as users can be from anywhere on the globe and all countries do not share the same laws with regards to online harassment and discrimination.

This case also highlights the need to equip local police with better resources and training to address cyber crime. According to the article, the FBI was involved in the investigation and discovered who the perpetrator of this case was only after the local law enforcement had exhausted their cybercrime resources. This meant that the victims had to endure the abuse for a longer period of time than they would have if the local police were better equipped to address this type of situation. 

This is also an example of a cyber-enabled crime, as the perpetrator did not need technology to bully her daughter. However, technology allowed her to engage in this digital crime due to the ability for her to be anonymous, which often enables online bullying, as well as tools that were made easily available for her such as using a VPN which facilitated her actions. 

In this case, the mother was sentenced to time in prison after pleading guilty to stalking a minor. While this is an American case, it shows that there is a need to expand the law in order to define more digital harms as actual crimes. This would help better protect victims of online abuse that are able to define their experiences within legal definitions and help to hold perpetrators of abuse more proportionately accountable. Contrastingly, in Victoria, due to amendments to the Crimes Act 1958, bullying is a punishable offence with a penalty of up to ten years imprisonment.