Christian Porter announced on Wednesday that he and the state and territory attorneys general would meet to discuss a major overhaul to Australia’s defamation laws on Friday. It would be the first major change to defamation laws since the arrival of Facebook and Twitter and the proliferation of online news sites. Here’s what we know about the plan.

What’s the problem with defamation law today?

National laws have been in place since 2006, with states and territories passing almost identical legislation on their level. But Facebook was in its early days, Twitter wasn’t on the scene and the most social of social media was MySpace.

Most news outlets had an online component but most journalism was still in print, radio or television.

Since then a series of cases have been brought before the courts targeting online publications, comments made on social media, and even search engine results. The Centre for Media Transition reports more than half of defamation cases between 2013 and 2017 involved something that happened online.

In the past few years there have been several high-profile cases where media have been ordered to pay millions of dollars in defamation compensation. Media organisations argue this has had a chilling effect on reporting in Australia.

“The defamation system is stacked against Australian journalists,” the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance’s media federal president, Marcus Strom, said in May. “It makes their job of shining a light into public interest matters all the more difficult.

“The system has become unworkable … Our current laws inhibit the public’s right to know, and rather than guaranteeing fairness … are being used as a weapon to threaten and attack legitimate reporting.”

Experts have suggested that Australia’s defamation law have stifled reporting on allegations of sexual harassment as part of the #MeToo movement in Australia.

The New South Wales attorney general, Mark Speakman, has led a review of defamation law since June last year, and said in an opinion piece published on Friday that the laws were no longer fit for purpose, and courts are “overrun” with minor claims related to “trivial comments” made on social media.

There is not a lot of detail ahead of Friday’s meeting but Speakman has hinted about what we can expect.

What will it mean for media?

The biggest change would be for online news articles. Under current law, any time an article is viewed it is considered a new publication, meaning publishers have indefinite liability every time someone clicks on an article.

The changes proposed by Speakman would mean “publish” as defined in defamation law means when the article was published on the internet, and not when someone clicks on it.

There would also be a defence similar to that in New Zealand law that would allow publishers to claim the material was “responsible communication on a matter of public interest”. Speakman also proposes a change to the cap on damages.

The cap on defamation damages is just under $400,000 for non-economic losses, but there are provisions in the act for “aggravated damages” which is why there have been millions awarded in the Wagner family case, and a high payout initially given in the Rebel Wilson case.

There is not enough detail in the information available to indicate whether any of the proposed changes would make it easier for media to report on issues such as sexual harassment allegations or any of the cases that led to media campaigns for defamation law reform.

What will it mean for everyone else?

The goal of the reforms is to stop so many neighbourhood disputes over comments made online ending up in court, such as disputes over emails about mailboxes in an apartment block, or about posts on a local community group.

Speakman said plaintiffs would need to show they have suffered, or are likely to suffer serious harm to their reputation, similar to how the law works in the United Kingdom.

“I acknowledge that this reform would leave aggrieved parties who don’t reach the serious harm threshold without a remedy, apart from shaking hands and making up,” he said.

“But the costs of defamation claims often massively outstrip the damage caused by actions that could be solved better over a coffee or barbecue.”

Prospective plaintiffs would also be required to provide a timely concerns notice so the matter could potentially be resolved quickly before it ended up in court.

What will it mean for Facebook and Twitter?

The first set of changes to defamation law won’t cover online platforms. Porter has flagged that the government will consult on whether Facebook and Twitter and other online platforms should treated the same as publishers.

Porter has said he believes they should be.

This is a direct response to a NSW supreme court ruling earlier this year that found Fairfax, News Corp and Sky News were responsible for comments made on their Facebook pages in relation to news articles about a former Don Dale youth detention centre detainee, Dylan Voller.

The bigger online platforms are concerned about being treated as publishers. Facebook did not comment on the reforms and Google did not respond by the time of publication. However, in its submission to the review, it said search engines should not be gatekeepers for what is or is not defamatory.

“The consequence of treating search engines as publishers is that they would be forced to become gatekeepers, withholding access to material that is potentially defamatory, without knowing whether it is, in fact, defamatory,” it said.

“Search engines are not well placed to adjudicate on defamation cases because the validity of claims and availability of defences are highly fact-dependent and often involve complex questions of law.”

Is there any disagreement between the states?

Guardian Australia contacted all the state and territory attorneys general. Those who had responded by the time of publication said they would wait to see the detail at Friday’s meeting.

A spokesman for the Victorian Labor government told the Guardian that Victoria is advocating for the laws to go further.

“Whilst we acknowledge the need for these reforms to proceed, we consider that more work is needed to address important issues, such as how the interests of victims are protected as well as protections for individual journalists.”

When is it likely to come into force?

It will vary state by state, but NSW, which is leading the pack, is looking at bringing in the first tranche of legislation by the middle of next year. The component related to online platforms will take longer.