Law / Fiji

Fiji

2 of 7 named instruments researched to a stage, across two of the six areas of law we track: 2 enacted but not yet in force. As of 7 September 2026.

AI law none researched
Privacy law none researched
Scraping law 1
Cybersecurity law none researched
Age gating law none researched
News aggregation law 1

in forceenacted but not yet in forceproposedrepealed, withdrawn or blocked

Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page.

Scraping law1 instrument, 1 enacted but not yet in force

Research summary (201 words)

Fiji has no scraping-specific statute, so the position rests on general law.

The Copyright Act 1999 protects an original literary work, defined to include a table or compilation, and permits fair dealing with a work for criticism, review, and news reporting or for research or private study, but its permitted-acts provisions carry no exception for text and data mining, so training a model on scraped copyrighted text has to fit one of those narrow purposes or infringe; the Act binds the State as well as private parties.

The Cybercrime Act 2021 replaced the Crimes Act 2009's computer-offence provisions and, per its arrangement of sections, includes an offence of unauthorised access to computer systems among others reaching unauthorised interception of and unauthorised acts on computer data, but the operative definition of authorisation and the penalty for each offence are not reproduced in the available copies of the Act.

No comprehensive personal-data statute reaches scraped personal information; the 2013 Constitution's section 24 right to personal privacy is the only general safeguard, and it binds a natural or legal person as well as the State. No sui generis database right, terms-of-service enforceability decision, unfair-competition doctrine, or robots.txt ruling for this jurisdiction has been located.

Copyright and text and data mining (TDM)

Copyright Act 1999, Fair Dealing and Criminal Liability for Infringement

Copyright Act, 1999 (Act No. 11 of 1999), ss. 41-42, 121Official English text, Copyright Act, 1999 (Act No. 11 of 1999), reproduced by WIPO Lex

Commencement not set. Binds public and private bodies.

What this law does

The Act received assent on 19 March 1999. Section 1(2) provides that it commences on a date or dates the Minister appoints by notice in the Gazette, rather than upon assent, and no specific commencement notice has been located.

Sections 41 and 42 permit fair dealing with a work for criticism, review, and news reporting and for research or private study by an individual, but the Act carries no exception for text and data mining, so training a model on scraped copyrighted text must fit one of those narrow purposes or infringe.

Section 2's definition of literary work includes a table or compilation, so a scraped compilation can attract copyright as a literary work if its selection or arrangement is original, but the Act creates no separate sui generis database right.

Section 121 makes it an offence, other than pursuant to a copyright licence, to make for sale or hire, import, possess in the course of a business, or otherwise deal with an object that is an infringing copy of a copyright work, and section 13 binds the State to the Act on the same terms as any other person.

What it requires

News aggregation law1 instrument, 1 enacted but not yet in force

Research summary (139 words)

Fiji has no press-publisher neighbouring right, no compelled platform-to-publisher bargaining code, no codified hot-news or misappropriation doctrine, and no statute or reported decision addressing whether linking to or framing a news article is a communication to the public.

Reproducing a headline or extract of a news article falls to the Copyright Act 1999's fair dealing exception for reporting current events (s. 41), which excuses fair dealing with a work for that purpose, accompanied by a sufficient acknowledgement where the reporting is not by sound recording, audio visual work, broadcast, or cable programme; the exception turns on the fairness of the specific dealing rather than a blanket allowance for aggregation.

The Act carries no text-and-data-mining exception, so an aggregator's automated indexing or AI training on news content must fit within the criticism, review, research, or news-reporting fair-dealing purposes or infringe.

Snippet reproduction

Copyright Act, 1999 (Act No. 11 of 1999), s. 41Official English text, Copyright Act, 1999 (Act No. 11 of 1999), reproduced by WIPO Lex

Commencement not set. Binds public and private bodies.

What this law does

Copying a work for the purpose of reporting current events by means of a sound recording, audio visual work, broadcast, or cable programme does not infringe copyright in the work, and copying a work other than a photograph for that purpose by any other means does not infringe copyright if the copy is accompanied by a sufficient acknowledgement.

Neither subsection creates a blanket exception for a news aggregator's routine reproduction of headlines or extracts; the dealing must still be fair dealing directed at reporting current events, judged on the specific facts.

Note and primary source