Fair Use of Alternate Accounts Act 2025

Fair Use of Alternate Accounts Act 2025

An Act to restrict Alternate Accounts.

Passed by the Senate on 25 May 2025.

Statutory provisions signed into law on 25 May 2025.

Note: the constitutional amendment failed on 1 June 2025.

Author: hmquestionable

Article 1: Title, Commencement and Definitions

§1. This is the Fair Use of Alternate Accounts Act 2025.

§2. This Act shall come into effect upon passage, and shall not be affected if the constitutional amendment contained herein fails referendum.

§3. In this Act, “Alternate Accounts” refers to an account owned or operated by a person on any platform on which SimDemocracy is located, which is not the account they most commonly use on that platform of SimDemocracy.

Article 2: Registry of Alternate Accounts

§1. There is to be a Registry of Alternate Accounts to be maintained by an agency assigned by Executive Order, or, if no agency is assigned, the SDBI.

§1.1. The assigned agency may make such regulations as may be necessary for persons to declare the existence, names and other necessary information of their Alternate Accounts to the agency, and for the agency to verify that the Alternate Account is not declared falsely.

§1.1.1. Accounts added to the registry must be notified in a channel designated by the agency’s regulations.

§1.2. An alternate account may be removed from the registry if appealed by the respective account, with sufficient proof adduced to show that the alternate account was falsely declared. This appeal may be made to the authority maintaining the account list, or a competent court.

§2. The Registry is to be public, and shall contain a list of every user’s most commonly used account on each platform which SimDemocracy is located on, as applicable, and their registered alt accounts, and any evidence used by the agency to determine that the alternate account is not declared falsely.

§2.1. The evidence used may be ordered to be removed by the Attorney-General.

§3. The Registry shall not contain alternate accounts which have been authorized to be added to the respective platform by court order, or by the Attorney-General.

§4. When an account is registered as an Alternate Account on the Registry, the account is presumed to be an Alternate Account in any proceeding unless otherwise proven, despite any other law relating to the standard of proof.

§5. An alternate account may be forcefully added to the registry if any competent authority proves, on a balance of probabilities, that the account is likely to be an Alternate Account.

§5.1. It shall not be necessary for the competent authority to prove the owner of the Alternate Account, and a separate section of the registry may be used for Alternate Accounts without the owner listed.

§5.2. Any Judge may approve such an addition.

§5.3. When considering whether an account is likely to be an Alternate Account, the Judge shall consider –

(a) The time of creation of the account;

(b) The profile pictures, usernames, and descriptions of the account;

(c) The time of the account joining SimDemocracy;

(d) The messages sent by the account;

(e) Whether the account has any discord flags on it, including the Suspicious DM Activity flag; and,

(f) Such other factors as the court may deem necessary.

This subsection shall apply in any criminal case where it is sought to be proved that an account is an Alternate Account.

Article 3: Summary removal of Alternate Accounts

<ref name="fua3">Article 3 struck down by In re Fair Use of Alternate Accounts Act 2025 [2026] SDSC 1 on 3 March 2026.</ref>

Section 1: Amendments to Criminal Code

§1. In Part 10 of the Criminal Code, insert a new Article 43 – “

    Article 43: Alternate Account Registry
    §1. The consent of the Attorney-General is required to initiate proceedings under this Article.

    Subdivision 1: Failure to declare Alternate Account
    §1. Any person who fails to declare their Alternate Account to the Alternate Account Registry established in the Fair Use of Alternate Accounts Act 2025 within 72 hours of the Alternate Account being added commits the crime of  “Failure to declare Alternate Account”.
    §2. An Alternate Account is an account owned or operated by a person on any platform on which SimDemocracy is located, which is not the account they most commonly use on that platform of SimDemocracy.
    §3. An account is said to be added when it joins or is otherwise included in any platform of SimDemocracy.
    §4. Any person who does not declare an alternate account already added to any SimDemocracy Platform within one (1) week of the passage of the Fair Use of Alternate Accounts Act 2025 also commits the crime of  “Failure to declare Alternate Account”.
    §5. The punishment for Failure to declare Alternate Account shall be a mute or ban of no less than one (1) week.
    §6. If an alternate account is in any way used to further the commission of a crime, or to commit a crime, the punishment shall be no less than one (1) month, or the minimum punishment for the crime(s) committed, whichever is higher.

    Subdivision 2: False Declaration of Alternate Account
    §1. Any person who falsely declares an account as their Alternate Account in the Alternate Account Registry established in the Fair Use of Alternate Accounts Act 2025 commits the crime of  “False Declaration of Alternate Account”.
    §2. The punishment for False Declaration of Alternate Account shall be a mute or ban of no less than three (3) weeks.
    §3. A person who proves on a balance of probabilities that they falsely declared the Alternate Account in good faith, or due to a genuine mistake, without intent to mislead any government agency shall have a punishment of a mute or ban shall be a mute or ban of no less than one (1) week.”
    

§2. In Article 23a of the Criminal Code, insert a new §6 and §7 –

    Ҥ6. It is not necessary to prove the owner of the Alternate Account for a conviction under this Article.
         §6.1. The standard of proof for determining whether an account is an Alternate Account shall be a balance of probabilities, despite any other law to the contrary.
    §7. The sentences available for Unlawful Use of Alternate Accounts shall be a ban of no less than three (3) weeks.”

Section 2: Constitutional Amendment

Referendum failed<ref name="failedref">Results of failed public referendum to amend the Constitution</ref>

§1. In Article 20, insert the following section:

    “§5. For the purposes of this Bill of Rights, accounts owned or operated by a person on any platform on which SimDemocracy is located, which is not the account they most commonly use on that platform of SimDemocracy, are not considered extensions of a person and are not granted these rights.”

Explanatory Notes

This bill allows for restrictions to be placed on alternate accounts.

Article 1 contains the title, commencement, and definition of alternate account.

Article 2 contains provisions for the addition of alts to the registry. Alts can also be forcefully added if it can be shown on a balance of probabilities that it is an alt account..

Article 3 contains provisions for the summary removal of alternate accounts.

Section 1 contains a new provision in the Criminal Code for a failure to declare alternate accounts, and a wrongful declaration.

Section 2 contains a constitutional amendment to exclude alts from having rights, which overturns In re Candidacy of Alien Users in the 2nd Parliamentary Election 2020 SDSC 19.

The alternate accounts framework is as follows:

If an account is on the registry, it may be summarily removed if the main account is banned muted arrested etc.

A suspected alt may be tried, and it is not necessary to identify the owner of the suspected alt. The standard of proof is also a balance of probabilities.

Amendments

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