An Australian court has reversed course and placed Bao Phuc Cao, a 24-year-old University of Melbourne biomedicine student, on the sex offender register after he was found to have secretly filmed dozens of women in public toilets and showers. The decision follows international outrage, amplified after Elon Musk commented on a viral social media post criticising the original lenient sentencing, and marks a significant reversal for a case that had drawn heavy public and political scrutiny over how such offences are punished.

Cao pleaded guilty to filming a woman in a Docklands shopping centre bathroom in February 2025, with police later finding more than 100 similar videos on his devices, though the exact number of victims could not be confirmed. In March he had avoided conviction, receiving only a community corrections order and two good behaviour bonds, despite this being his third instance of such behaviour since October 2024. On Monday, Magistrate Michelle Mykytowycz ruled he posed a risk to women's "sexual safety", ordering eight years of police monitoring, strict reporting conditions, a ban on working with children, and effectively barring him from professions such as medicine.