The administrators of an Oamaru Facebook group used for illegal fish sales said they would welcome any advancement in technology to help them screen users to stop the site being used for crime.
On April 26, father and daughter Toni (59) and Malama Givani Fifita (26) were convicted in the Oamaru District Court of selling fish illegally through the Oamaru buy, sell and exchange Facebook page.
They were remanded for sentence on May 31.
The Ministry for Primary Industries brought the case against the Oamaru family for selling a "black market" product, the court heard.
The summary of facts stated that on November 16, a person calling themselves "Lane Oscar" offered bags of mullet for sale for $20 through the community sales page.
Other Facebook users advised Oscar selling fish this way was illegal. One posted a link to the ministry’s website containing the rules and another user advised Oscar they would be fined.
The person who made the post, Ms Fifita, told commentators "if you don’t wanna buy don’t comment" and "nobody cares".
A complaint was made to police, who contacted the ministry.
The Fifitas were convicted on charges of possessing yellow-eyed mullet for sale in contravention of the Fisheries Act, and benefiting from selling the fish.
Oamaru buy, sell and exchange administrator Fleur Newton said it was the first time she was aware of her page being misused for criminal activities.
However, Mrs Newton said earlier in the page’s five year history police contacted her about someone using community Facebook pages to move stolen guns.
She said Facebook had never approached the page offering advice on how to run a sales site or any input on how to stop the page being used by criminals.
It was near impossible to tell if an item being posted was stolen, Mrs Newton said.
"You’ve got to trust that people are honest. We’ve got thousands of people [in the group]."
Mrs Newton said if there was technology being created to help screen people or items they posted for sale, she would use it on the page, but until that happened administrators would have to rely on the honesty of page users.
On Monday night, Mrs Newton advised her sales community she would implement changes to stop her page being tarnished.
She wrote that in light of recent incidents and the court case, more administrators would be added to the group.
"Not happy with the dishonesty of some that are ruining it for many," she posted.
