The government yesterday tabled its response to an inquiry into sexting, announcing it will adopt two key recommendations.
The first will protect minors who take explicit images of themselves being prosecuted for child pornography offences.
The second will create a new summary offence which will make illegal the sharing of intimate images without consent.
Law Reform Committee chair Clem Newtown-Brown said under the current system, minors taking images of themselves were unintentionally captured by the Crimes Act.
"There were reports of children being put on the Sex Offenders’ Register," he said.
While the Committee found such cases were relatively rare, and police had the power to use their discretion in prosecuting child pornography offences in this context, it said such a loophole should not exist.
Sexting is not illegal when carried out between minors with no more than two years' age difference, or adults, under the new legislation.
But forwarding such images on to a third party will become a summary offence under the legislative change, the penalties for which are yet to be announced.
Mr Newtown-Brown said this type of activity was common when relationships broke down and could have "very dire consequences for victims who are embarrassed and humiliated."
A further recommendation the government create a digital tribunal, with the power to order websites to remove images, was not adopted by the government.
