Fediverse is a bunch of independent websites potentially connected by compatible software, not one entity, so there’s not really a basis for comparison. You could ask about individual instances. But also it’s about “failing to cooperate with a probe into anti-child abuse practices”, not hosting or failing to moderate material. Australian law says they can asks sites about their policies and they have to at least respond.

"The Fediverse" is about 13,000 separate services that are each individually responsible for illegal content on their systems. Some probably aren't doing a good enough job, but most of them are and they've mostly defederated the ones that fail to do so.

And why wouldn't they? Many hands make light work and the fediverse has tens of thousands of moderators to deal with far fewer posts that the X network. Twitter had a decent moderation team once, but Musk has gutted the team.

Since there is no hierarchical top general moderator/admin and every instance is under supervision by the respective owners of these instances, responsibility of safety is technically forwarded to individual instance admins as far as their instance goes. Or that's what I make of it at least, anyone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. Also, the above conclusion does not include any possible random future law made up to state differently (decision-making entities have weird unpredictable logics... 😅)

As far as for Mastodon itself, it could use some upgrades in its user management and reporting features, though (an option to automate instant reactions (like tempban until reviewed) on certain categories of reports (like child abuse and extreme/shocking violence) to prevent anyone reported for those kinds of things actively being able to continue until an admin sees and processes the report and reports are definitely not visible enough yet).