Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Facebook representatives for coming in and taking the time. It is an important issue. I have to be honest and say that the Facebook Ms de Bailliencourt is describing is not my experience of Facebook or the experience of most people I know. I do not believe it is a forum free from harassment or bullying in any sense. I would not under any circumstances allow my children to use it because of my experiences on it and those of many people I know.

I have several questions relating to people not using their real names. There are profiles where it is so obvious that people are not using their real names. There are numerous profiles where there are no pictures of the person and it is so obvious that it is a fake profile. Despite this, if I report such content to Facebook, the company replies by thanking me and saying that I have done the right thing but that the content does not violate its community standards. How many times does a page have to be reported to Facebook for the company to act on it? What does Facebook define as bullying? Some of the problems highlighted are very obvious, including images of child pornography. Such things can clearly be classed as bullying. However, bullying is subtle and that is the difficulty with bullying in every forum, whether school, work or social media. Let us suppose a given page consistently targets individuals, consistently lies about those individuals and is reported on numerous occasions to Facebook by numerous people but the company does not do anything about it. That is the responsibility of Facebook. Facebook is responsible for the consequences for people who are experiencing that bullying and for the impact it has on their mental health. I am unsure whether the Facebook representatives actually grasp the seriousness of that.

There has been a rise recently in the amount of mental health issues and anxiety. I put a great deal of that down to Facebook. It is not only a matter for me. I have been on Facebook for nearly ten years. From what I can see from the number of people who use it, anything that is reported comes back. The company says that the material in question does not violate Facebook community standards. What violates community standards? The examples given by the Facebook representatives are obvious things. Obviously, if there are images of child pornography, they would be removed. I am referring to subtle bullying that goes on for years against an individual. I do not accept that Facebook cannot see that something is a fake profile or fake page. It does not take much investigation to find out such things. Moreover, there is no forum for someone to contact the company. There is no contact number for Facebook. A person is very limited in what she can report. A person has to tick a certain box. An hour later – I have no idea what sort of investigation the company can undertake in an hour – there is a message to say the content does not violate the standards of the company. The person is asked to give a further explanation. That is the only opportunity a complainant has to explain exactly how the content amounts to bullying of or to harassing or damaging individuals. I say as much as an adult. Under no circumstances will I ever allow my children to go on Facebook or use Facebook until they are over 18 years of age.

Facebook needs to do far more in respect of monitoring and the impact of this material. We see it all the time. People put up pictures of someone. They put up degrading and derogatory material. Facebook statements claim the company does not accept anything degrading or derogatory. I could offer thousands of examples of how that goes on and how Facebook does absolutely nothing about it.

I am keen to hear what exactly is the last straw for Facebook. When will Facebook take action on certain pages? How many complaints does the company need to get? How many legal letters does Facebook need to get? What is the limit for people? The impact that this is having on people and on their mental health is real. It is going to go into the next generation. It is going to go on to our children unless people, parents and guardians take a strong view and isolate their children from most social media. The Facebook forum is not a safe forum for anyone, including children, unfortunately. I feel very strongly about this.