Ms Helen Dixon:

I do not think there is any intervention that ComReg could make in that regard. I acknowledge the Senator has raised a very serious issue which concerns a number of agencies and policy areas across the State. In particular, the issue falls within the remit of Coimisiún na Meán in terms of the regulation of content.

An issue with regard to the overarching point, which is common across a lot of areas of policy, is the age verification of children online. Part of the problem is that we do not know, the phone does not know and the content provider serving has not identified the user as a child. This was a very vexed question in my previous role as the Commissioner for Data Protection because to identify a child is to identify every adult, potentially, as well. In general, the view has prevailed to date that it is better to have an open, democratic Internet where anonymity remains a possibility and users are not constantly tracked by reference to their identity at every turn. The downside is that children are exposed to an adult Internet and not protected from harms. Unfortunately, I do not think ComReg has a solution along the lines proposed. It would not fall within our powers or be permissible and I am not sure it would be effective, given the age of users is not identifiable.