Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Before we begin, I welcome members of the politics society in St. Mary's College, Arklow, who are here for the day with our esteemed colleague Deputy Byrne, who I am sure is looking after them very well, and will take care of them throughout the day. I am delighted they have come to the committee. It is a very wide-ranging committee, so they might want to follow us more regularly. Today we are discussing online safety. The issue is very important to everybody, but most importantly to their age group. They are all very welcome.

Today's meeting has been convened to continue the committee's consideration of the regulation of online platforms and supports to improve online safety and participation. I welcome the following witnesses: Detective Chief Superintendent Barry Walsh, Detective Superintendent Michael Mullen, Garda National Cyber Crime Bureau; Edel McGinley, executive director, and Niamh McDonald, director of advocacy and community engagement, Hope and Courage Collective; Ciarán O'Connor, senior analyst, Institute for Strategic Dialogue; and Dr. Eileen Culloty, co-chair, and Martina Chapman, national co-ordinator, Media Literacy Ireland.

The format of today's meeting is such that while we usually have statements, with the number of witnesses we have today, with the committee’s agreement, I am going to go ahead and take those statements as read. We will have questions and answers from the committee members. Is that agreed? Agreed.

Before we move to today's discussion, I would like to clarify some limitations in relation to parliamentary privilege and the practice of the Houses as regards references that may be made to other persons in the evidence of witnesses. The evidence of witnesses physically present or who give evidence from within the parliamentary precincts is protected, pursuant to both the Constitution and statute, by absolute privilege. In respect of the presentations witnesses make to the committee, this means they have an absolute defence against any defamation action for anything they say at the meeting. However, witnesses are expected not to abuse this privilege, and it is my duty as Chair to ensure that this privilege is not abused. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative they comply with any such direction.

Members are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice to the effect that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against a person outside the Houses, or an official either by name or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable.

Apologies have been received from Senator Ní Chuilinn.

Having taken the statements as read, I want to say they are excellent statements. In my time as Chair here, they are some of the best statements I have seen. They are fairly frank and open. I compliment each and every one. We usually have statements read, but considering the number of groups here, and to save time because there is huge interest among committee members, we are going to go straight to questions. I call Deputy Brennan.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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I thank our witnesses very much for their opening statements. I had to hang on to every word, literally, of every one of the statements. They are so relevant in what is happening in the current climate.

Can I rewind the clock to 31 January 2024 when the CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, was brought before the US Senate judiciary committee? The gallery was full of parents of children who had died as result of issues that related directly to Facebook. They were dressed in black. They were holding photographs of their kids who had died. He was asked two questions. First, was anybody fired in Facebook because of what happened to these kids? The answer was simply "No". The second question was: did Facebook compensate any of the families because of what happened? The answer was "No". His final answer was crucial. He was asked for a comment. He said simply their job is to "build industry-leading tools". In other words, he did not care. That was his work. If that did not set off alarm bells, nothing would have.

We are at a crossroads. These weeks and months are going to be crucial. We are simply dealing with a runaway train that is being run and driven by key people sitting in their lofty towers who are consumed by commercial greed and have zero moral responsibility. This must be called out for what it is. Our problem is what is in place to stop this train. Based on the evidence that we are sitting here and that we can still access Grok this morning, the legislation is simply not in place. We need to discuss as a unit here today how we can put this in place. Have we let down a total generation by not having these safeguards in place? More importantly, what legislation is needed to protect the children who are coming? This is not going to stop as we roll into the AI era as well. We need to have the safeguards in place because self-regulation is simply not working in relation to social media.

I admire the work the witnesses from An Garda Síochána are doing. What action, if any, has been taken against X in relation to its facilitation of the platform?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

From our perspective, I will address the holistic perspective that has been put forward first. We all realise that we are living in an era of rapid technological change. Within that has come some significant challenges. There is legislation that has come online and is coming online over the foreseeable future that will have impact in supporting------

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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I am conscious of time. Will Mr. Walsh answer the specific question? What action has been taken before today on the issue that is on the table at the moment?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

On the issue that is on the table at the moment or the issue that has been subject to public commentary over recent days, from our perspective we have received reports and referrals of content on that particular platform that is under investigation.

As the Deputy knows, the investigative process takes some time. The content has to be assessed in order to make sure it is criminal. Thereafter, the people responsible have to be identified, if possible. The investigative action stems from there. What follows is the investigative process. That may result in various different actions, such as execution of warrants, interview of people responsible, and bringing those people before the courts where the DPP directs. More support for the regulatory environment has been put in place recently. We have been in contact with Coimisiún na Meán over the past number of days. We will be meeting it again tomorrow to discuss this matter further and bring it forward in the context of what support we can offer to the commission in the context of its functions in this area.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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Mr. Walsh is confirming that there is an ongoing investigation by the Garda in relation to this matter.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Images that have been distributed-----

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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It is a simple yes-no answer.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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That is all I need to know. Does Mr. Walsh feel that we need further legislation? We obviously do. This is still live as we speak.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

In the context of the alleged offending that we are dealing with, I believe the legislation we currently have enables us to carry out the necessary investigation. Nothing has emerged yet that I am aware of that will prevent us from carrying out an investigation.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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I thank Mr. Walsh. Malaysia and Indonesia have blocked this site. Why has Ireland not blocked it?

Dr. Eileen Culloty:

Under the Digital Services Act, blocking access is one of the actions that can be taken, but it is not the last action. The question is whether it would stand up in court.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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Why has it not been blocked?

Dr. Eileen Culloty:

I assume it is because those at European Commission level do not know if it would stand up to scrutiny.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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I thank the witnesses for being here and for the submissions they made. I will look at this live issue and build on some of the answers that they have already provided.

I will start with An Garda Síochána. There is much frustration, concern and confusion about what the prosecutorial and investigative picture is here. It seems there are more barriers to investigating and prosecuting crimes that happen online than in the physical world. I want to get under the hood of that. Can the witnesses help us to understand the difference between traditional policing and policing online crimes? Why do we not see prosecution for these crimes at the same scale as in-person crimes? Is it an issue of lawlessness online or differences in policing?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

We do see prosecutions for online crime and online offending.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Not to the same scale.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

I probably would accept that from the point of view that there are complexities involved in investigating online crime. One of the complexities involved with online crime is getting the evidential information to sustain both an investigation and a prosecution. Often, that requires us to go outside the jurisdiction. Going outside the jurisdiction generally involves engagement with the mutual legal assistance process, which takes a number of months or, in some cases, even longer. That can create a complication and time delay. Regarding other elements that have to be considered, processes have to be followed as a legal necessity before building up to a search, an arrest and submitting a file to the DPP.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Those processes probably exist anyway. Why is it more complex when it is online?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It is not necessarily, but, in light of the current commentary, there is an expectation of an immediate response. Unfortunately, an immediate response is not always possible from the perspective of An Garda Síochána. There are processes which have to be followed, in gathering evidence to sustain the investigation and a prosecution. We have to comply with legal processes.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Mr. Walsh has confirmed that X is currently under investigation. One of my questions is about the Garda's interaction and collaboration with Coimisiún na Meán, which Mr. Walsh mentioned. For this investigation and more broadly, is An Garda Síochána relying on reports and referrals or is it proactively seeking evidence, as Mr. Walsh just described?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It is not necessarily that X is under investigation. I said that images that were distributed via X are under investigation. They have been notified to us.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Mr. Walsh is not making any assumption yet that X might be the culpable party in that investigation.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

No. We follow the evidence in that regard. That is what we do in all instances.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Of course. Mr. Walsh has confirmed that there is an investigation under way. In order for that investigation to happen, is the Garda relying on reports and referrals alone or does it proactively seek evidence?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

We are involved in both.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Does the Garda have a notification process for Coimisiún na Meán?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

No.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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No.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

The normal notification process as it exists at present is that referrals are submitted via the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, NCMEC, in the United States. The referrals come to Ireland via that channel. There is a reporting channel via NCMEC.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Is Mr. Walsh referring to NCMEC?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Will he tell me a little more about that organisation?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

NCMEC is an entity that operates in the United States. All the major service providers report via that channel.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Coimisiún na Meán does not come to the Garda when it gets reports and referrals.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It does if it gets reports and referrals, but that is not necessarily the channel they ordinarily come from. We meet and engage with Coimisiún na Meán, but it is generally not the reporting entity for service providers.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Would it be more helpful if Coimisiún na Meán were able to-----

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Legislation is currently in train in Europe that will put in place a European NCMEC, for want of a better way of putting it.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Is that the AI Act?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

No. It is the child sexual abuse directive.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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The Garda is operating solely on the basis of US referrals in relation to this particular investigation.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes, and some proactive work as well where that gives us an insight into misbehaviour. We would then follow that up.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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What does the proactive work look like? Would Mr. Walsh mind giving us a little more detail in that regard?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It involves going online and trying to see open-source intelligence in order to see if we can get anything that we can follow up by way of evidence. It is, generally, a more complicated process in terms of getting the tangible outputs we need to transition into evidence, but it still has to be done to get some idea of the threat landscape and what is available in the public domain.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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I thank Mr. Walsh. I am going to move to Media Literacy Ireland to discuss the same topic. I will try to get to Mr. O'Connor too. Perhaps the representatives of Media Literacy Ireland could help us to understand. As policymakers, do we demonstrate the understanding that incorrect information may be easier to deal with than something which is intentionally targeted to mislead? Do we have the regulatory structures to tackle disinformation?

Ms Martina Chapman:

Media literacy cannot be used as a corrective action. In the first instance, you need the regulatory and legislative environment to counter disinformation or any one of a number of challenges associated with digital participation. Media literacy is about developing and helping the public to develop the skills and knowledge to empower them to make the best possible use of the digital services and content available to them.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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I will ask a question, if I can fit it in, of Mr. O'Connor. I am interested in his research into misinformation and disinformation and the proliferation of both online. Does he think there is funding coming from outside Ireland that is supporting the promotion of disinformation within Ireland?

Mr. Ciarán O'Connor:

From an evidentiary perspective, that is very difficult to prove because of the online structures of how digital platforms operate. There are numerous opaque ways in which funding can be generated or received. We see some surface-level sources of revenue via merchandise shops, PayPal links or Revolut links and those kinds of things. The attribution side of that can be enormously difficult as well. From a research perspective, even in terms of the data provided to research organisations, it is incredibly challenging to point fingers or to try to attribute who is receiving funding and from where, even domestically.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Does Mr. O'Connor think the EU democracy shield has done anything to assist?

Mr. Ciarán O'Connor:

I am not expert enough on the democracy shield to comment, unfortunately.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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Does anybody else wish to comment? No.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the witnesses for their comprehensive reports, which obviously involved a huge amount of work.

I am the father of four young daughters. What came to light regarding Grok last week was absolutely sickening. I know that feeling is, without question, shared by thousands of parents across the country.

As is often the case with technology, innovation arrives first and the law follows later. I totally accept that. The real challenge for us in this room and for the Dáil as legislators is trying to keep pace with these technological developments that are advancing at an exponential rate every single day. I am steadfast in my view that the responsibility must first and foremost rest with the big tech companies. There are the likes of X that has given two fingers to tech regulations and two fingers to the children in this State. It is disgraceful what it has been allowed to do. It has a duty to society, especially to our children, including mine and yours, to prevent the creation and circulation of deplorable and disgusting content. Large multinational companies are developing power tools, and they cannot ignore how those tools are being exploited by degenerates in this country for their own sexual gratification. It is disgusting.

As legislators, we have a duty of care to every child in this country and we need to do more. In the opening remarks from An Garda Síochána, there was one line that stuck out to me as follows:

It is difficult to understand why robust age verification is not yet a standard operating procedure in respect of any platform where pornography or other child inappropriate content is either readily accessible or where there is a realistic danger that it could be accessed.

We have a problem here as a country. There is a massive gap here.

I wish to develop further on what the two previous speakers said. On images that would have been shared recently and there are ongoing investigations which is welcome, how many investigations or individual cases are ongoing at the moment?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

As of this morning, there are 200 reports that are being investigated involving content that is child sexual abuse material or child sexual abuse indicator material. That is what is the status is as of this morning.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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Is that a significant increase on previous years?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

As I mentioned in my opening statement, there has been a year-on-year increase. Unfortunately, this is a type of crime that I have been involved in going back 17 or 18 years now. The National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, NCMEC, is probably the primary source of referrals for this type of material. Every year that has increased. Last year, there were approximately 25,500 referrals that required consideration. That was a big increase year on year because-----

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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There were 25,000 referrals in Ireland.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes, for suspicious activity in Ireland. It is important to emphasise that a lot of those referrals would be indicative of child sexual abuse material. They might not meet the threshold for investigation.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I understand that.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Some of them will not have evidence available to follow up. There is some element of-----

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I apologise for cutting across Mr. Walsh. It was 25,000 last year, which is a phenomenal figure. Those numbers have blown my mind. What were the figures in 2024?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It was about 13,300.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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It has almost doubled in the past 12 months.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

There was a change in the law in the US that has now necessitated mandatory reporting. That was probably a driver in terms of the increase. Certainly, that is where we are putting it down to.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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If a constituent comes in to me at home and for example, their daughter has been exposed to fake AI generated images and they ring the Garda to state that their daughter has been exposed to these images, what is the process? Will Mr. Walsh talk me through quickly step by step what happens? How quickly can somebody be prosecuted?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

The first priority always for us is to get the content removed from the online environment. We do that in tandem with hotline-----

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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How long does that normally take? I am hearing about experiences where it could be months before it is taken down.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It just depends. I do not mean to be vague about it but I cannot give the Deputy a specific time in which it happens. It can depend. It can be very quickly versus a lot longer. People can request to have the content taken down. That is also an option for people. There are reporting mechanisms within the service providers.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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This is not against An Garda Síochána or anything but I have come across examples where constituents of mine have reported images. The speed at which the feedback came back was about as quick as I would run 100 m. It was unbelievably slow and this was if they came back at all. It is very unsatisfactory. Again, this is the experience about which people on the ground are telling me.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

I cannot speak for individual cases that I do not know anything about.

Typically, what happens then is you have to gather the evidence. The evidence tends to be the online indicators such as Internet protocol, IP, addresses, usernames and those types of elements that would enable us to identify the person responsible, and you follow those up. They are generally followed up by way of an order - a warrant served either in Ireland or abroad. Where it is abroad, it becomes a much longer process.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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All going well, how much would it take to lead to a prosecution?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

A very quick prosecution includes the submission of a file to the Director of Public Prosecutions, DPP. It could potentially take a number of months. That is the reality of it.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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Briefly - I am conscious of time, as I only have a minute left - I want to talk a little bit about Coco's Law. If an image is generated online, there is great awareness out there that, under Coco's Law, it is illegal to share intimate images, photos or videos of nudity, sexual activity or whatever. There is great awareness among the public that it is illegal to do that but if an image is AI-generated, what is the situation with that? Is it illegal to share or threaten to share that content?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes, certainly. The critical thing is the level of distress the person feels. An image-----

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I refer to it being AI-generated. Obviously, if I take a picture and I share it, under Coco's Law it is absolutely illegal but if I get a generated image, or somebody does an AI-generated image of an individual that is sexually explicit and they share that, is that illegal in this country at the moment?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

My understanding is that, yes, it is. I have not seen any example where it is not.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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For an AI-generated image-----

Mr. Barry Walsh:

The principle, as far as I am concerned, is the legal precedent. That would be my understanding of it.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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Okay.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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I will start by welcoming all the witnesses here with us today. It is very timely considering the focus there has been on online platforms and online safety in recent days, in light of the revelations about Grok. As a woman, I feel particularly vulnerable online at this moment and I am sure that is echoed by many of my colleagues in the room and around the table. For women, parents and teachers in our society at the moment, I think there is a huge fear for our youth, and we had many of them here in the Gallery not so long ago taking an interest in this. There is a huge and realistic fear that our youth and women are particularly exposed to exploitation online at the moment.

With that in mind, I hope the detective chief superintendent will allow me to challenge a line in his opening statement, where he said, "I sincerely hope that the robust response to recent events from across society will instigate a concerted trend [to clamp down on this]." I wish to ask him, first and foremost, what he sees as that "robust response". He cannot tell us how long it takes to take these images down. I understand the difficulties that come with that but the first thing that any woman would want is to have that image removed. The first thing any parent would want is to have that image of their child removed. I am not quite sure where people would see that there has been a robust response. I understand there may be constraints to that but could the detective chief superintendent could give us a quick elaboration on what he thinks the robust response has been from the perspective of An Garda Síochána?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

From my perspective, what I meant when I said that was in regard to public commentary. It is hard to disagree with the Deputy with regard to the abuse of personal dignity that this involves. I cannot give the Deputy specific examples. There are positive examples where content is taken down very quickly. As has been mentioned by the Deputy's colleague, essentially there are bad examples too. Ultimately, the request is made to take down content.

Going back to the Deputy's point about us being proactively engaged in the whole domain of, in particular, children, parents and trying to make them aware, we have, over the last number of years, been very active at school and college level. We have met parents and had conversations about the dangers of the online environment and have been trying to say to people that if something is in the online environment, you have then lost control of it. We are trying to make people aware of how to be more proactive in regard to this area.

On our preventative effort, we have been very proactive and have given robust messages to people. In one particular example, we engaged with parents on one occasion and a few days later engaged with their kids. We saw a huge uptake in parental controls on their mobile devices as a result of those conversations. There is a preventative piece we are trying to do. We recognise that the investigative process is not always as efficient as people want it to be, particularly when, as the Deputy said, you are in that position where you are exposed and feel exploited.

That is very harmful to people. It is psychologically harmful to people; we are very aware of that. It is not the case that we are not making every effort to get this removed as quickly as we possibly can. We work very productively with hotline.ie. One of the elements we are very conscious of is getting the material offline as soon as we possibly can and making sure it is removed from that domain-----

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Not to cut across Mr. Walsh, but that is key. While all of that is very welcome, and robust messaging and language is crucial, how that transitions to enforcement is key. It was said that at the meeting tomorrow An Garda will see what support it can offer to Coimisiún na Meán, but I trust Mr. Walsh accepts there is a collective responsibility from the Government, Coimisiún na Meán and An Garda Síochána to ensure that enforcement of the regulations is what transpires at the end of this.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Absolutely. From our perspective, Coimisiún na Meán is the regulatory authority. We are there to provide whatever support we can to it in that environment. Enforcement of criminal law is our job. We are there to make best use of the criminal law available to us to enable us to do that. We can reassure the public in that regard. Where we get an investigation, we will follow it up as efficiently and effectively as possible.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Mr. Walsh alluded to the fact that although Grok has been getting the headlines in recent days, other AI tools are available that can do similar things. The fact that was mentioned in his opening statement, and I am open to him clarifiying this, I presume means An Garda is already aware of other AI tools and is monitoring them as this progresses. Will he give us a quick briefing on what steps An Garda is taking to tackle that?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

From my perspective, and what I said in that regard, is that conceptually these are trained models. I am not aware of specific examples where those particular types of models have been trained but, conceptually, it seems apparent that it could happen.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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It can be done.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It is important that the public commentary has had influence on the mindset of those responsible for these models to make sure safeguards are in place to ensure that what has been in the public domain over the last number of days is not repeated in their models.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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If there are not other specific examples, are the 200 images that have investigations ongoing all from Grok?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

They are. They are Grok.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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To move slightly aside from that, Mr. Walsh spoke about misinformation, disinformation and hate speech that has resulted in violence on our streets, which we are all very aware of. That has become par for the course in recent months when there is a resistance to something. Has An Garda spoken to, suggested or proposed possible new laws with the relevant Government agencies that it may see are required to tackle that? Is Mr. Walsh confident the legislation is there at the moment to arm and equip An Garda to be able to deal with that situation?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

From An Garda Síochána's perspective, we have said consistently that we have not seen any lack of legislation to enable us to enforce that and to deal with the issues that are arising.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Okay. That is fair enough. I will leave it there and come in for the next round.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Deputy Carrigy is not here and we have apologies from Deputy Ó Snodaigh.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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I again welcome our witnesses. I thank them for their opening statements. I recall comments made by the Minister of State, Deputy Smyth, on "Prime Time" last night about the enforcement issue, that this is an enforcement issue and sufficient legislation is in place. I am still unclear, and this is bearing out in the questions coming from other members, on the action of creating a naked image of a child or an adult. Is sharing that a criminal offence?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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It is a criminal offence.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Of a child, yes.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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Is Mr. Walsh saying, from our perspective as legislators, that further legislation is required to try to address what is a very fast-moving and evolving situation we are trying to play catch-up with?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

There is legislation across all the areas coming to the fore now that has been and is being enacted. One of the big things for us, historically, as I mentioned, has been getting access to evidence in an efficient manner. The evidence issue is now going to be transposed into legislation. That will be helpful to us in being more efficient in gathering our evidence. From my perspective, for the offences we have seen up to now, we have sufficient legislation to enable us to deal with those. In terms of gathering evidence more effectively, the Garda powers Bill will be helpful to us.

Those elements of legislation will make the process more efficient, recognising the complexity and type of environment in which we now operate as it is no longer in this jurisdiction alone. A lot of the evidence we have to look at is, potentially, outside this jurisdiction. Historically, that has been a complication in the investigative process.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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First, I must mention an article written by Ian Guider, for the Business Post , stating that the European Commission in December had "fined X €120 million for breaching the Digital Services Act (DSA) in relation to transparency obligations", describing it as a "rounding error" in the context of Musk's fortune. This is the scale of the problem we are dealing with. As legislators here, we are trying to play catch-up. I am sure the enforcement authorities and An Garda Síochána are the same.

I was taken by an excellent report produced by the Hope and Courage Collective entitled Fires of Hate: Arson as a Far-Right Tactic in Ireland. The report is about arson attacks and how far-right agitators use the online sphere, and the issue particularly around algorithms and the recommenders. The initial intent of the Coimisiún na Meán Bill was that the default would be that those recommenders and algorithms would be switched off. Is that something to which the Government should give consideration?

Ms Edel McGinley:

Yes, absolutely. It should totally give it consideration. We need to look at this from a very systemic place and I think that the conversation should go up a level to look at the role of social media companies and their responsibility in protecting and keeping us, our communities and people safe. We, members of this committee, as legislators, and civil society, have a responsibility in that.

We believe it is really important that we look at the algorithm because it creates the environment for attacks, harassment, violence, arson and criminality in the State. There is not any sanction available at the moment in terms of that. The Digital Services Act, DSA, covered transparency around algorithms but reports on the companies are very opaque and one cannot actually understand them. What we have said for a very long time is that those algorithms need to be turned off, by default, until it is proven that they are safe.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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Yes.

Ms Edel McGinley:

Right now, they are not safe for our communities and people. It is up to those companies, which is their revenue stream, to prove to us and legislators that they are safe and fit for purpose. Right now, they are not fit for purpose. We believe they should be treated like the big tobacco companies of our day and be treated with such regard.

We believe that the Garda should be the last resort. We need to look at that systemic level. We need to look at content moderation. There has been a total row-back on trust and safety teams. That is not the solution either but it is that systemic risk that social media companies get away with all the time. It is about the bottom line. It is about hitting companies in their pockets.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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Yes.

Ms Edel McGinley:

Their model is one of engagement, and in order to engage people, there must be content. The more emotive and harmful the content, the better because it engages and grows activity. That is the nub of this here today.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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I agree. The fines are a pittance in terms of the profits made. X has put Grok behind a paywall.

Returning to the report on arson attacks, it is critically important. This has caused utter devastation and heartbreak for families and it threatens people's lives. The report concludes by stating, "It is clear that extreme violence such as arson does not happen spontaneously".

The report also points to our role as political leaders and that we bear some responsibility for these arson attacks. The case of Drogheda was mentioned and the anti-immigrant narratives that are being put out, not just by local politicians but sometimes within Government. I believe our messaging as political leaders is vital. I wanted to make note of that comment because it is critically important here.

Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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I welcome the witnesses. As I listen to them, it seems clear that if we talk about Twitter, X and Grok, we are missing the point that this could be any online provider, distributor or purveyor of deepfake technology. Whenever I hear people going on about Grok and Elon Musk, I wonder if we are missing the big story, which is what we are doing to deal with and get ahead of this problem. I am coming to the view that regulation is not so much the solution here but is almost emerging as the problem. What I mean by that is that we are not grasping the issue of the need to legislate. When I hear the witnesses say that they feel that the laws are more or less there to deal with the problem, I wonder if we all need to think again here, because if we do not criminalise the production, distribution and indeed accessing of deepfake materials designed to denigrate the human person, in whatever way the law crystallises, then we will end up constantly playing a game of cat and mouse around regulation. That is why we are here. It is because nobody is clear about what exactly can be done.

I hear from Dr. Culloty that the European Commission is not sure whether it is appropriate to take the step of blocking, or whether that would go too far, or be knocked down, presumably by the European Court of Justice. How are we in this situation where we cannot decide what best serves the common good without looking over our shoulders to see if European law will stop us from doing what we need to do? I have been saying this here before. I have been asking Coimisiún na Meán, the Minister and indeed the European Commissioner not too long ago about whether the EU will get in the way of member states' need to do what they have to do in order to protect their citizens.

The question that I would like to ask the Garda members in particular, but also the others here, is whether, if it was an offence to generate, distribute or access deepfake images generated around real or actual human persons, with a view either to misleading the public or for any purposes associated with sexual gratification or exploitation, that would not be a clear law that would do what regulation is not capable of doing. Would that not be a helpful law?

I have a question for politicians too. I heard it when we had the discussion in the Oireachtas about Coco's Law. People were bending over backwards to protect certain kinds of quasi-pornographic and sensual activity by adults and pandering to the demands of people relating to OnlyFans and so on. I am wondering whether an undue deference to certain adult appetites is actually getting in the way of child protection and our being able to protect vulnerable men and women from exploitation through clear, criminal law, produced in our own jurisdiction, with civil as well as criminal consequences for people who upload, distribute, generate or even access it. What public good is served by people being able to create deepfake images of a sexual exploitation kind? This question is for everybody here. Are some adult appetites getting in the way of our need to provide proper protection of children, in particular, but also other people who might be exploited, through appropriate criminal law? I ask all the witnesses to address that.

Mr. Ciarán O'Connor:

I am by no means a legal expert but I know there has been much commentary about the 1998 Act and 2020 Act on non-consensual intimate imagery and, of course, child sexual abuse material too.

It comes back to the issue of consent by adult creators who use these social media platforms versus the non-consensual use of generative AI models. What I think has made this topic so pressing and unique in the past week or two is that X and Grok illustrate a unique combination involving a generative AI model that is available and actively used in public on a social media platform. Grok is being used in private to create similar imagery but it is a private platform to the user. The difference is that with Grok there is the availability of these tools and with X there is the visibility of these tools such that there is an added public impact based on their use by users and the lack of enforcement of community guidelines or terms of service by platforms like X and others.

Ms Edel McGinley:

The gardaí might agree with the following. We have a lot of laws that are in place and we need to enforce them. I will go back to what I said around the systemic nature of platforms, that when we look at tackling individual behaviour we are missing a trick. We have to tackle the systemic behaviour of social media platforms as entities. When we move to that individual responsibility at an individual level, we miss the systemic. If we leave here today with nothing else, it is about the systemic nature of harms and abuse that social media perpetrate on our society on people, including young people and children.

Dr. Eileen Culloty:

It is worth remembering that it is not the EU or regulation itself that is the problem; it is the model of regulation we have, which is a co-regulatory model which gives an awful lot of freedom to the platforms. They are meant to report on risks and things like that. That is proving to be quite ineffectual at the moment. It is therefore the model that is the problem. Also, when the Digital Services Act was being adopted, the European Commission used the tag line "what is illegal offline will be illegal online". It does not seem to use that tag line any more, but that is what was being promised. It is an enforcement issue now. I do not think we need new laws specifically; we need to enforce.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

I think we all recognise that, as regards legislation and An Garda Síochána, we are at the end point of the cycle, where an offence has generally occurred, which is where the legislation tends to come into effect. It is about detection of offenders, penalisation and rehabilitation in the best-case example. Going back to the point I made, the prevention of harm and the protection of people are always a better solution. That is a whole-of-society requirement. There is a huge responsibility on those who provide the service-----

Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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But is that not what criminal law is for?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Well, criminal law is about-----

Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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But if we had a criminal law preventing the creation of such deepfakes for sexual purposes, we would not be having this discussion. The problem would be off the table. We are playing cat and mouse through regulation, and people are trying to get away with whatever they can get away with because we do not have clear criminal law banning this stuff.

Alison Comyn (Fianna Fail)
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I thank all the witnesses for coming in and for their very powerful statements. I urge anybody watching this to read them. They will be available. This discussion is very timely. We know what is happening with Grok and with the advancement in AI abuse. We saw last night high-profile cases on RTÉ's "Prime Time". Our Minister of State, Niamh Smyth, is doing incredibly well. She is up to speed with this, and I am encouraged by that.

These crimes are crimes. They are not new. I will rewind to when I was a young news anchor with the BBC in the mid-nineties. Some bright spark cut photographs of my face out of magazines and put them on pornographic images and sent them to my workplace. I found it deeply upsetting and violating. The police thought it was quite funny at the time and did not take it seriously, which is another issue, but at least the images were not seen by millions. Now what we have is a legitimate business, a high-profile platform, that can legally offer this service. It is disseminated to millions globally and we are looking at content being created in seconds and sent out at the touch of a button. We know that it is children and vulnerable people who are at risk here. We have to stop that in its tracks.

Also, having been a journalist for three decades, I am horrified at how little fact and verification it takes now to put out information, misinformation and disinformation. There are no sanctions whatsoever.

Legitimate businesses, proper media, are now even more robustly fined for anything that is remotely wrong and yet the platforms are not. I agree with some of my colleagues in that as a female public representative, I am open to gross abuse on a daily basis. I am talking about threats of violence and sexual violence. I have reported them all and 99% of them are not upheld. I would like to know how we can assist the witnesses with prosecuting and taking these down, not only the degenerates who are using these AI tools but also those who are using the platforms and hiding behind anonymity there, and how we can assist with targeting the other platforms as well.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Legislation was recently developed in terms of intimate image abuse - Coco's Law. That is effective in terms of being able to prosecute this type of offending. It is something that did not exist previously. People are becoming increasingly aware that legislation exists that means this is not legal or tolerable any more. We are seeing an increase in reporting in that area since this law has come into effect. As I have said consistently, it is the process of getting evidence behind the report that has been a complication. The criminal justice (co-operation office) Bill will have impact in that regard. It is an important development.

Alison Comyn (Fianna Fail)
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Mr. Walsh mentioned that it is difficult to find the source sometimes. What does he feel about anonymity? I feel there should be no anonymity allowed. The protection of minors and vulnerable people is much more important than freedom of speech. Should these platforms be offering anonymity? It is very difficult for the Garda to prosecute.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Anonymity and privacy are big issues for us. We are on record consistently as saying that. It is something that is subject to increased lobbying. In respect of the child sexual abuse directive, there is consistent lobbying going on in that area. It is hard to understand how protection of vulnerable people online trumps privacy. I fully respect people's right to privacy. They have an absolute right to privacy. In terms of protecting children online, again I am consistent in this, it is an environment that is very scary for a lot of people. There a lot of age-inappropriate content available to them. Unfortunately, the use of VPNs creates a complication. There are a lot of privacy-oriented tools such as the likes of messaging apps with end-to-end encryption. It creates huge difficulty for us. That is the reality of the situation and it can act as a really insurmountable barrier to prosecution.

Alison Comyn (Fianna Fail)
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I addressed that to others but I may move on, and we might get back to it in another round of questioning. I do not have time to read out an incredible letter to The Irish Times that people may have seen, from a teacher, Aisling Mullally, who is at the coalface of what is happening to our children who are being given screens at ridiculously early ages and the content they are seeing. I urge everyone to read it. Are parents, guardians and teachers sufficiently supported to understand emerging threats such as AI-generated imagery, online extortion and disinformation? If not, what is missing and what needs to be done to educate them?

Ms Niamh McDonald:

I thank the Senator for the question. I will just bring it back to the toxic algorithms and amplification online that is completely unregulated at the moment. I will explain a little bit about how the algorithms work. As the architecture was set up to sell stuff, it is a product designed to sell. The more outrageous or salacious the content, the more the algorithm will engage with it. The more that it is engaged, the more people will like, share and comment and the more it is pushed up to the top. That is the best way to explain it. This rewards and prioritises the content by pushing it up the top. We also have to understand that a by-product of this is that bad-faith actors, anti-immigrant actors, far right people, conspiracy theory people, neo-Nazis and white supremacists have figured out how to game the system. That is what we are talking about right now. That is why we are talking about how dangerous it is online for a whole range of people. I understand we are talking about vulnerable people and children. We are also talking about the violence this is causing in our communities, the disruption, unrest, the disinformation and how it is causing division. We can see internationally and globally what this has done as well. We can see the power these companies are holding globally too.

Now, they can see this is a huge tool within the playbook of all these actors. We are saying these toxic recommender systems should be turned off by default because they are dangerous. They are causing this amplification.

For instance, I followed the Citywest violence online that night. We looked over 22 pieces of content on X over a 90-minute period. This resulted in 1,183,970 views, just from 22 pieces of content. These included a Garda car on fire, violence and horses being used. That is just one snapshot in that context. It was the same playbook as used in the November riots of 2023. They knew how to game the system and the algorithms to keep pushing things to the top. The day before, it was the same in all the pieces of content.

Alison Comyn (Fianna Fail)
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What is the exact target, then? Where do we have to go? Where do we put the bull's-eye?

Ms Niamh McDonald:

It is with the algorithms. Turn off the toxic recommender systems that are recommending outrageous and dangerous content to everybody. It does not matter whether it is a child. Sexual and violent content is being recommended to children. It could be eating disorder content. There is a bingo card of what can be there. I understand the focus is on children, but it still leaves a toxic system, so let us go back a step. The Garda is the last port of call. We need to go back a step and look at the toxic recommender system and how we can create a safe online space that creates safer communities, which I think we all agree is what we want here right now.

Alison Comyn (Fianna Fail)
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Go raibh maith agat.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the witnesses for coming here today and for their work more generally. I am particularly conscious of the Garda, because not alone do its members have to enforce the law, but there are members of the force who have to experience this material as well. I know from talking to them that it is particularly horrific. Our first obligation as legislators has to be around the safety of our citizens and people who reside here. That is our first obligation ahead of everything else. Regarding some of the discussion, I am very conscious, and it was mentioned by Mr. Walsh, that in terms of the child sexual abuse directive, privacy rights are being argued around it. Every piece of law is about a balancing of rights, but I do have a problem in this regard. As legislators, I think we are sometimes losing our focus in terms of what our priority needs to be. If we look at what the US was able to do post 9/11 when it came to matters around national security, it was able in those circumstances to demand platforms make particular data available, and there has been a long running dispute involving Max Schrems between the EU and the US.

Coming back very much to first principles, we have got to look at how we can protect our citizens online and, in particular, our most vulnerable citizens. I just want to check something that was said. A question was asked earlier about protecting children and adults, and this is in the context of Grok and AI. Obviously, with regard to AI-generated child sexual abuse material, that is very clearly covered by legislation. Where there is the problem where we have adult materials that are AI generated, particularly involving an individual's image or likeness, and it is deeply upsetting, as my colleagues have said, for women in particular because it is targeted particularly, although not exclusively, at women, will the witnesses outline the circumstances there? Coco's Law is very clear. However, if, for instance, someone were to AI-generate a likeness of a particular or identified individual, what course of action would they have where it is an adult?

Mr. Michael Mullen:

I thank the committee for the invitation. It makes no difference. If it is AI-generated, it is still a criminal offence under Coco's Law. It is as simple as that. It will be investigated as if it were a real image, so AI is treated exactly the same as a real image.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Okay. I might just bring in the witnesses from Media Literacy Ireland. Again, I thank everyone for all the presentations. As the witnesses will know, this committee has very much recommended that MLI's role be put on a more permanent footing. One of our biggest challenges is around media literacy. Having dealt with Coco's Law and with the Garda, part of the success was as a result of the public information campaigns done on radio and television about Coco's Law, because people became very aware that you do not share intimate images. It is very clear. I have been talking to students and they know very clearly about it.

What do we need to do, because I think education is a major part of this, in our formal education system and in public information campaigns on these issues?

Ms Martina Chapman:

In terms of media, the Deputy is absolutely right that public awareness campaigns are critical, and when they are done well, they can be really successful. They work most effectively, however, when it is a clear, simple, singular message. One of the challenges we have with media literacy is that it is such a broad area. It is an umbrella term for a huge range of skills and knowledge that we all need to be able to participate safely and effectively. In terms of campaigns, we need to be very careful about what we are raising awareness of, what the message is, and what the call to action is.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Let me be very specific about what we are focusing on, which is Grok. If Ms Chapman were designing the Government information campaign, what should the focus be?

Ms Martina Chapman:

Given that, as we have been discussing here, there is legislation and regulation in place, media literacy is not the corrective action. It is a really complex digital space and media literacy is never going to replace or compensate for any kind of complications in terms of legislation or regulation. In terms of media literacy, it about empowering people with the knowledge that, similar to the Coco's Law messages, once a person shares content online and has images out there, it is very hard to pull them back. There are tools and apps out there that can allow this content to be generated, but also we need to emphasise that this is illegal and to help people understand that if things go wrong, there are steps they can take and how to take those steps.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I chair the Committee on Artificial Intelligence. One of the things that comes back from groups is that when we talk to educators, teachers and parents, they feel, quite frequently, that they are not equipped to be able to address some of these issues.

Ms Martina Chapman:

This is critical. One of the things MLI is doing on a regular basis is trying to embed and trying to connect with existing learning networks for adults outside the formal education system. Because technology is moving so quickly and the challenges are changing and evolving all the time, in order for teachers to feel confident and prepared to be able to discuss these issues in classrooms, they need constant support. Webwise has made some really strong recommendations in this area and it provides great resources.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Is the Department of education responding quickly enough to the challenge?

Ms Martina Chapman:

I can say that Webwise.ie, which is funded by the Department of education, produces some really good advice and support for teachers and parents about how to talk to young people about nudity apps. These are exactly the kind of resources that are really useful.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I have one final question. When the Online Safety and Media Regulation Act was going through the Houses, one of the ideas that Senator Shane Cassells and I on this committee proposed was that, where a platform knowingly and wilfully allowed onto its platform a dangerous programme or one that would lead to harm, in those circumstances the platform could be held criminally liable. It would be the same principles that we apply to environmental law, company law and corporate law. I get it just on the fines, and some of the fines are eye-watering, and I think Coimisiún na Meán is doing a good job, but my big concern is that part of the problem is that fines are not sufficient. I do not know if the Garda witnesses present are in a position to comment on that. Obviously, they would have colleagues who are operating in the company law space and there are reasons orange is the new black, so to speak, and why there is particular responsibility in corporate enforcement, but do they think it would help if, on the design side, individuals were held culpable rather than foreign companies?

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Deputy Pádraig O'Sullivan is next.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Could I just get a quick answer?

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Yes, in the next round. I have to be fair to everybody.

Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North-Central, Fianna Fail)
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Sorry I was late, but I was listening in. The first point I would like to address, and I am not sure who actually said it, but they said is that, whatever about the actual necessity of new legislation, there needs to be consistent enforcement. I am addressing the question to that person, whoever it was.

It was implied that there was almost a lack of enforcement. I do not expect that witness to point the finger at anyone specific but will she elaborate on that response? Where are we falling down in terms of lack of enforcement on this issue?

Dr. Eileen Culloty:

That might have been me. It was in the context of the Digital Services Act, which is a co-regulatory model. Similar to what the Deputy was describing, companies are meant to conduct risk assessments before services and products are put out there. They should demonstrate that they have assessed what harms might flow from these services and products. In principle, that is a good approach. The problem is that the companies are clearly not doing it. When they do not do it, nothing happens. That is the enforcement part.

Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North-Central, Fianna Fail)
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To follow on from Deputy Byrne's point, there is a difficulty in many aspects of law. The reason I was late is that I was on a Zoom call with Cork County Council about an environmental issue. Fraudulent waste collectors might get fined €50,000 when they have an income of tens of millions of euro. It is in that context that we are losing this battle. Twitter, or X, Instagram, Facebook and Meta are massive corporations worth hundreds of billions of dollars. In light of that, they are not going to respond in the collaborative way that is now set up. That is the issue that concerns me the most.

I have a question specifically for An Garda Síochána. Deputy Cleere mentioned this earlier. The headline figure caught us all. Mr. Walsh said there were 25,000 referrals in respect of suspicious activity relating to child pornography and sexual imagery online last year. Obviously, not all of these lead to cases and prosecutions. However, in the opening statement, he said the Garda have 80-odd staff in a unit to deal with this stuff. Is that sufficient to handle and sift through that volume of cases given that it doubled from 2024 to 2025 and is likely to double again with the way things are going?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

The forensic element of what we do is the end point in that investigation cycle. Historically, there would have been a lot of commentary on our excess caseload and the fact that we were overwhelmed in that regard. As a result of investment over recent years, our excess caseload has decreased. We have 58 cases that have not been actioned, which is down from a number in the hundreds. It has enabled us to diversify the services we provide. It has had an impact. In terms of investigating that type of crime, we also have a divisional protective services unit available in every division. These units also investigate this type of crime. That involves hundreds of people. The resources have been put in place and we are dealing with that type of criminality.

Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North-Central, Fianna Fail)
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However, what if it continues on the current trajectory? As I said, the number of cases doubled from 2024 to 2025. AI is getting smarter and smarter every day. It is likely that there will be multiples of that 25,000 in the next couple of years. How is the Garda going to-----

Mr. Barry Walsh:

That will potentially be the case. It is a matter of looking at the resources allocated versus the requirements and allocating resources, if available, as required.

Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North-Central, Fianna Fail)
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I am somewhat reassured by the detective chief superintendent's earlier response when someone mentioned Coco's Law. He said that AI images would be treated in the same way as a real image in any criminal case. I just wished to reiterate that is the case.

Mr. Michael Mullen:

As Detective Chief Superintendent Walsh said, we are talking about a bureau with 83 staff. Of course, we have numerous responsibilities. In the past 18 months, he has put 18 of our members, 16 part-time and two full-time, into victim identification. He talked about the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, NCMEC, referrals. A lot of them lead to the identification of children in Ireland who are very vulnerable. Our protective services bureau goes out to safeguard those children. At the same time, those 18 people in our bureaus are looking at all the media that comes in as part of our investigations. As well as bringing people to justice, we also look to identify the children in the media to safeguard them. We have invested significantly in the end of the line where children have been compromised. We get to some of them from the NCMEC referrals before there is any significant damage. Our bureau looks at all the material that comes in with a focus on bringing people to justice from an evidential perspective, but we are also very focused on safeguarding the children.

Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North-Central, Fianna Fail)
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I will ask a broader question. Coco's Law has understandably been referenced numerous times. How many prosecutions have there been since this law came into effect?

How many cases have there been and how many prosecutions have there been on foot of that?

If we are talking about using a computer or the Internet almost as a weapon, what I am referring to is people's ability to stalk people using online media as a tool, harassment or child pornography. I do not expect Mr. Walsh to have definitive data about all those examples but what percentage of overall criminal matters coming the way of An Garda Síochána involves the use of the Internet, a computer or social media? It is obviously becoming more prevalent.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

All the crime we deal with involves the use of a computer or the Internet. I am not in a position to say how many prosecutions there have been. I do not have that data but I can try to get it and pass it on. I know just under 900 incidents were recorded last year in that area.

Pádraig O'Sullivan (Cork North-Central, Fianna Fail)
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Under 900.

Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Deputy Malcolm Byrne and I were members of the media committee of the previous Oireachtas when we dealt with the Online Safety and Media Regulation Bill, which was significant legislation, and we fought for many things, including an online safety commissioner, which was not in the original legislation, to strengthen it because from our engagements, we had seen the need for it, particularly for our youth. I have three young children and I can see the difficulties that are there. We put forward a recommendation during Committee Stage of that Bill about a minimum age for children having social media accounts. That is the simple answer to an awful lot of the problems. If children do not have accounts on these platforms, we would not face the issues we are discussing here today but we have backed away from it. We are waiting to see what the EU is doing. In the meantime, we are four years on and it still has not happened. We need to grab the issue by the scruff of the neck and just do it. The opening statement from the Hope and Courage Collective mentioned that it generates billions of dollars but leads to real-world harm and that harm involves our children, who have access to these platforms. I welcome the comments from the Minister, who has said that he is going to take a strong view on it.

We met with the Australian commissioner previously to see how Australia dealt with it. Australia has taken that decision and that is what we need to do. We just need to make that decision. It is the right thing to do. When speaking to children in schools who are 16 or 17 years of age, they agree that they are better off not having that access. We are the adults in the room. We are the people who are meant to make decisions and laws and we just need to do it. It is the safest way of doing it. If we keep our children away from these platforms, they will be unable to see any harmful content on them. Parents do have a responsibility to moderate and not give their children free access to social media but all these companies have many billions of dollars in profits and assets so they should be able to put systems in place. We need to put those systems in place because these companies are making too much money and do not want to do it.

I have had issues with stuff online and threats being made against my children because I am in political life but it was dealt with very efficiently by local gardaí. Whatever needed to be done was done to find out who was responsible. It was not the same in the courts when I got there but it was dealt with very efficiently by the gardaí so I must compliment the work done by An Garda Síochána.

Why has this not happened? Why are we not taking the steps necessary to do it? We have been talking about safeguarding our children for many years.

There are simple answers to it but we are not prepared to make the jump. What do we need to do and why has it not been done?

Ms Edel McGinley:

I would like to go back a tiny little bit on age verification and anonymity because they are really important. The knee-jerk reaction is that the right answer is that children have to provide their documents to verify that they are of a certain age. That is not necessarily the right approach because there are very real considerations around privacy. Again, it sort of misses the point in terms of the role of social media platforms. There should not be hate, disinformation and all of that online but there will always be ways around it. We have to be really careful when we look for age verification. I do not trust social media companies with my data. I know there are different proposals here, but they are also a knee-jerk reaction to the situation we are in. We really need to consider them very carefully. The Irish Council for Civil Liberties has a very oppositional approach to that particular proposal. I again go back to the systemic risk. We should be making-----

Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Which is the bigger risk? Our kids' future is a bigger risk, which I think supersedes any of these things. I apologise for cutting in. We find reasons not to do things rather than doing the right thing, which is to protect our kids.

Ms Edel McGinley:

Why are we not holding the social media bosses to account? Why does the Government not do that? That is what it needs to do, not monitor children's access to the Internet - yes it is, absolutely - but it is the role of the Government to hold those bosses to account. That is the job, and that is not happening. Anything less than that is not fit for purpose. What we are talking about is that things are not fit for purpose. We are at a tipping point now with social media. The last year has been an absolute disaster in terms of the row-back on trust and safety teams and how social media impacts on democracy and elections. Mr. O'Connor will probably say a little bit more about that. We have to look at social media companies and how we hit the bosses where it hurts.

Dr. Eileen Culloty:

When we talk about banning young people from social media platforms, it is very important to be specific about what we mean by social media platforms. If we are talking about something like X, let us say, it is entirely reasonable to ask why a platform that allows explicit content in its terms and conditions would also allow young people. That is a very fair question, but there are social media platforms that have good design features and we would not want to ban young people from those. If it is presented as a blanket ban, then there will be lots of pushback, whereas if the Government is very clear then platforms that have not demonstrated any interest in the safety of children should not have young people on them.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I totally agree. I thank the witnesses very much. I have a few questions and observations of my own. In my time in this committee this has probably been one of the best meetings, if not the best, that we have had because it is getting through very detailed, sensitive and tricky subject matter. It is obviously quite topical at the moment but maybe that alignment is going to result in some action.

We decided as a committee some time ago that we were going to do a very robust report on online safety. We are halfway through this and it is getting wider as we go on, especially with the events of the last few weeks. We are determined. We have all the platforms coming in to us on 4 February. Three of the four have confirmed their attendance. I will let everyone guess who has and who has not confirmed, but not here. We are determined to produce a report that will hopefully help to direct where we are going to go as a society.

By God, we have to do it very quickly. Time is not a luxury here. We have to deal with this issue.

There are a few observations I want to make. It has been quite complex. It is not all about regulation. It is about the companies but it is also about personal behaviour. There is a pie chart here which relates to criminal law, regulatory process and how regulation is done, and the whole issue of education. There is one thing that gets forgotten, namely societal management of this. All four of them have to come together equally as part of what we are going to do here. I was struck by what somebody said to me recently. We license drug companies under a licensing system in this country. We do not license social media companies. It is not fully about the regulatory model. I was very much taken by what was said earlier about the co-regulatory model and how it is not working any more, because time has moved on in many ways. Would we license a social media company to come into our country and behave the way Twitter-X-Grok is operating now? The statement from An Garda Síochána today was one of the best I have seen. It was so honest and direct. The Garda is left almost in an impossible situation. The volume of resources, time and capacity, out of jurisdiction, that would be required for the Garda to actually process criminal cases here makes it virtually impossible in some cases and very difficult in many. There has been a lot of talk about legislation and everyone is going to have a different opinion. An Garda Síochána here today referred to about 25,000 referrals of which it is now pursuing 200. They are all related to child pornography or AI child pornography, is that correct?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes, across a broad spectrum of service providers.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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How many cases is the Garda pursuing in respect of an image being distributed under Coco's Law, which my colleague, Brendan Howlin, championed? In cases where images or AI-generated images of adults have been distributed against the person's will, how many cases is the Garda currently prosecuting or looking at?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

As I said to the Deputy's colleague, I do not have data on how many prosecutions have taken place.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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How many cases?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Last year it was 883 cases.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Let me distinguish here, so. There were 25,000 referrals and Mr. Walsh brought in the whole thing about NCMEC which, to be honest, is an education to us. Obviously there are other forms of referrals. Are those 25,000 referrals just in relation to potential harm issues with children?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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We do not have a total amount as regards potential harm to adults.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Those would not come from NCMEC.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I know that. I am just talking about An Garda Síochána full stop.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

The number of incidents reported to us last year is the number I cited there, 883.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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That was last year.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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That is the totality of 2025. I would suspect, given the activity over the last few months, that is going to increase dramatically.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It may do. I do not have figures for that.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I say that going by the law of averages, given what is after happening. Under Coco's Law we have the provision to prosecute the sharing of images without people's consent. It does not necessarily deal with pursuing third parties like X, as far as I can see. Under section 5(1)(f) of the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act 1998, I would suggest there is provision for the pursuance of X and other platforms. I am wondering about a gap in legislation in respect of the sharing of AI-doctored images of adults.

I do not know and do not profess to be the expert - hands up, I am just chairing a committee that is pointing out an issue - but I am not 100% convinced, having gone through both sets of relevant legislation, that we have robust capacity where AI-orientated images of adults are concerned, which is the topic that really has been pushed out there, to prosecute or to investigate at the level we require within our jurisdiction. Is Mr. Walsh confident that we have?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

From my perspective, there is a difference between child sexual abuse material and intimate image content.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Absolutely, 100%. That is the point I am getting at.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

The intimate image content requires a complainant for us to investigate. What I would say is, I agree with the Cathaoirleach to some extent in how it has traditionally focused on the perpetrator of that type of offending, rather than the vessel of that type of offending. I am not aware of any prosecutions that have taken place or that there is a law to cover that particular eventuality.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I will move on but can I ask Mr. Walsh to restate that, because it is a pertinent point for this committee. Mr. Walsh is not aware of any prosecutions. Go ahead.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

I am not aware of any prosecutions of any vessel that facilitates that particular type of activity online.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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In this country, we have never prosecuted any entity that has facilitated the distribution of such imagery.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Not that I am not aware of.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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How many cases have we prosecuted whereby either a real image or an AI-generated image of an adult has been used in a criminal way?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

I have to offer my apologies, I do not have that information.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Has Mr. Walsh a rough idea?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

I do not, I am afraid.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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In comparison to child pornography-----

Mr. Barry Walsh:

I would only be guessing.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Mr. Walsh might provide us with that information.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Absolutely. I will take it away, and my apologies about that.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I thank Mr. Walsh.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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To close out that point and to clarify, has An Garda Síochána ever taken a case against a social media company-----

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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The answer is "No".

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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-----for sexually inappropriate images?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Not that I am aware of.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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That just seems-----

Mr. Barry Walsh:

I do not want to mislead the committee. I do not know. I am not aware of that have having happened. To the best of my knowledge, it has not happened.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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That obviously means that a social media company has never been prosecuted by the Garda.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

In respect of this type of offending, not that I am aware of, no.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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Considering there have been 25,000 referrals, does Mr. Walsh not think that is a very strange statistic?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Well, I mean, with child sexual abuse material what we tend to do is look at the offenders.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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I want to stay on the company. I am very aware the Garda is on top of the offenders but the actual company itself is the key.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Traditionally, that has not happened. That is all I can say in relation to it.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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Okay.

Someone mentioned early on that the key thing was to hit these social media companies in their pockets. I understand that statement but I simply cannot accept it. Number one, these people have so much money, it is absolutely irrelevant to them. Number two, I read recently there is €4 billion of fines out there, and only €20 million has been collected. To finish off on that point, while my personal opinion is that Ms McGinley is 100% right in saying that the boss has to be held account, these bosses must be held to account in the court of law. The sight of a social media company standing in the dock will send out the strongest message possible. Ms McGinley wants to come in on that.

Ms Edel McGinley:

I wanted to respond to clarify what pocket I mean and where to hit them. The design of social media companies is that they promote advertising. That is how they generate revenue. The design basically, is through engagement. They want to keep us glued to our phones so we are constantly being fed ads and things to buy.

That is part of the design. It is addictive design, and it is engagement. Again, going back to the recommender system, it is the recommender system that keeps us engaged and keeps us in that doomscrolling that we do. It keeps those advertisements coming. That is the revenue, not the fines. That is the revenue I am talking about. It is the design, actually, the overall architecture and design of algorithms that we do not fully understand and know because there is a lack of transparency across all social media companies in relation to this. That is the pocket I mean, not the fine.

Brian Brennan (Wicklow-Wexford, Fine Gael)
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I thank Ms McGinley.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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That was an important point.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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For absolute clarity, I brought it up originally and it has been touched on, we spoke about Coco's Law and how the non-consensual sharing of intimate images by AI is illegal in Ireland. It is illegal for children under the age of 18. It is illegal for adults as well.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Under the age of 18, it is child sexual abuse material.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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However, over the age of 18-----

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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-----it is illegal.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

Yes.

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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That is a really important message. If one message were to get out of this committee today - I know there are members of the media here - that is the key message that needs to get out there: if a person is over 18 years of age and he or she is in the Republic of Ireland and shares an AI-generated image, it is illegal. That should be reported, and that person should follow the process and be prosecuted. For me, that one bit of information is the highlight of this two and a half hour meeting. I thank Mr. Walsh for clarification on that.

I will pass this question on age verification to whoever wishes to answer. Young children are really smart. They are digital natives. We are digital immigrants. They are absolutely brilliant in terms of what they can do and how they can manoeuvre on the phones. They buy and sell us, really, if the truth be told. We can put all the safeguards in place we want but I was made aware recently of this virtual private network, VPN, thing where an app comes up for a VPN. It is completely free. People can change the settings for their location and everything is out the window. I will give an example. I have three nieces who are living in Australia. They might not be happy with me saying this because I am dobbing them in here. Australia brought in the bans for under-16s. All they do is go on to this VPN app, change their location to Ireland or whatever country - it could be Japan, America or wherever. It just absolutely does not make sense. Is there anything we can do to stop that practice happening? We can put all the safeguards and all the regulation in the world in place but, Jesus, if these things are allowed to happen, it makes a mockery of all the regulation we are going to put in place and we are going around in circles.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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"No" is the answer. We will-----

Ms Niamh McDonald:

Again, I am going to go back to this. We need to make social media companies or these online platforms safe for everybody, not just children. We cannot just cut children out of it. The Deputy was talking about how they are digital natives. I have a young boy as well. They will find ways to get on it. Our role here is to make it safe for everybody in our communities and go back to the recommender system. Until we know they are safe, we should have them turned off by default and there should be transparency on how they are created and the architecture. We have a massive opportunity in this committee right now from what the Cathaoirleach said, so let us use it.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Fair play. Mr. O'Connor wishes to say something.

Mr. Ciarán O'Connor:

I will add to that and echo the point that the onus should be put back on social media platforms because-----

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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It is on the individual.

Mr. Ciarán O'Connor:

Yes, and parents, especially in that dynamic. Platforms can and do prioritise different actions like enforcing copyright law when that is infringed in very quick time. Therefore, they should be taking similar urgent action for the safety of our own children and young people online as well. When there is an issue that is pressing enough, we have seen action but perhaps not in the same way for child safety and welfare online.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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I take exception to comments made by Senator Noonan earlier. I would not like it to go out as a statement of fact from this committee today that elected officials in Drogheda portray an anti-immigrant narrative. I have been at the front line of politics, both locally and now nationally, since 2016 and I am very proud of the inclusive-----

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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I did not specifically mention Drogheda.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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You did.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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I was talking about-----

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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You did.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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I was talking about local representatives and-----

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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I am very proud of the inclusive approach taken by our elected officials in the town-----

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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Okay.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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----- despite, I would go as far as to say, a stroke move by a Government the Senator served on to rip the heart and soul out of our town by closing a hotel last year.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Okay. We will move on.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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I have two final questions to all the witnesses if they could answer briefly. We spoke about the Online Safety and Media Regulation Act. We spoke about Coimisiún na Meán's online safety code, the EU Digital Services Act and, of course, Coco's Law. Are the witnesses all confident that they are all being utilised sufficiently by authorities to tackle everything we have discussed today? If the answer is "Yes", that is fine. If not, what areas do we need to focus on more?

Would each of the witnesses support an amendment to the Online Safety and Media Regulation Act that would make it illegal for companies to supply the AI tools that are creating the images we have spoken about at length today? Mr. O'Connor might start.

Mr. Ciarán O'Connor:

There is a procedural element to the Irish-----

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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If we could just be brief.

Mr. Ciarán O'Connor:

"Yes" is not enough for an answer, unfortunately. There is a procedural element. Evidence is being gathered, and it will take time to show. If we take the fact from the DSA that it requires significant risk assessment, and we see something like Grok being rolled out so quickly, it does raise the possibility that sufficient risk assessment was not done and if it was, it is lacking. It is not necessarily thorough. Therefore, it is going to take time for these pieces of legislation to bed in and for evidence to be gathered by organisations to feed into the EC for its own investigations as well.

Ms Edel McGinley:

We said in our opening statement that there is an over-reliance on individual content moderation under the DSA. Coimisiún na Meán is overly reliant on individuals and third parties to submit cases to it to build up a systemic risk assessment of anything. It is very slow. It is not a very good process in which to build that overall picture of systemic risk at scale and swiftly. Therefore, the enforcement is really slow. We have a lot of legislation. We also have general data protection regulation, GDPR, legislation, which we have not spoken about here today.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Do we need to amend the Act to make it illegal for these companies to supply the tools?

Ms Edel McGinley:

The AI tools? I cannot comment on that because I do not know.

Joanna Byrne (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Okay.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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By way of clarification, I was referring to the Hope and Courage Collective report in relation to the extreme violence in Drogheda and I was making a general point about some politicians more generally.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Okay.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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I apologise if there was any inference there in relation to specifics.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Okay. The witnesses, please.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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I will ask quick questions. Specifically, this goes back to the point on the prosecutions of the body corporate under the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act 1998. Section 9 makes provision where any of the above offences are "committed by a body corporate and is proved to have been committed with the consent ... or to be attributable to any neglect on the part of ... [the] person, being a director". It goes on to state "that person as well as the body corporate shall be guilty of an offence". This is the critical point here-----

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I made a reference to that.

Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
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-----because we are talking about the fines and the fines not being collected. It is actually that a custodial sentence is the only thing that is really going to hit some of these companies. That is a critical point that we need to take away from here.

Separately, I will make the point as well, and it has been made, that this is destabilising our democracies globally and it is destabilising our democracies here in Europe and in Ireland. Certainly, we made attempts in bringing forward the Electoral Reform Act and we brought the social media companies in then. The representatives sat around the table in the Custom House and talked to us about self-regulation and trying to water down the measures around disinformation and misinformation in that legislation. They spoke about ensuring that online political advertising was conspicuous and that those who pay for online advertising that should be front and centre. There is a much bigger impact here. We are seeing it in relation to the Copernicus report as well today. It is in relation to misinformation and disinformation about climate change. There is a huge collective responsibility on us as legislators to challenge this because it is destabilising democracies throughout the world.

Again, I thank all the witnesses.

Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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To the Hope and Courage Collective first, I take it that what Ms McGinley means in relation to age verification and the cautions around it is a requirement on children accessing social media generally, but I ask her to take on board that until the day when pornography goes online, strict age verification is necessary to shield children from the harmful effects of pornography. What I did in the Private Members' legislation I brought forward last year is to create an obligation on any purveyor of pornography to insist on strict age verification.

It is about putting the obligation on them. That is the only thing that has worked if we look at certain states in the USA, where with bipartisan support, pornography providers have gone offline because they were civilly or criminally liable if they did not ensure strict age verification. It is really important in the public interest, and given the responsible work the witnesses have to do, that this point is taken on board.

More generally, I know everybody here is hard working and knows their brief, but what I would take away today is that we are not yet in problem-solving mode. If everybody is focusing on their own corner of the pitch, the Chair's forensic questioning about the lack of prosecution of companies under Coco's law makes it very clear that legislators must act. Experts of various stripes must support the need for legislation. Curbs in the public interest on the application of new technology to the generation of pornography would be a good place to start. I have heard no argument against that, but I have heard no clarity from people here today about what kind of regulation is needed. That is because an excessive focus on regulation leaves us in a cat-and-mouse situation where nobody really knows what we need. We need legislation. If it was an offence for X or anyone else to provide a tool that could be used for deepfake pornography generation or distribution, we would not be having this conversation here today. That is the reality. A lot of experts are not taking seriously that we need to attack this problem at the roots. If we have too much focus on privacy rights and adult rights, we are missing the picture because children and victims of sexual violence are vulnerable. It is vital that we have a much more root-and-branch approach to this issue. I do not think people are thinking sufficiently outside of the box on that point.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Ms McGinley can respond very briefly.

Ms Edel McGinley:

I know we have to make additional submissions on age verification to clarify what we mean, and we will do so, but we have been very clear about what we need, which is legislation around recommender systems.

Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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That I get.

Ms Edel McGinley:

We have been very clear about that.

Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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That much is clear but it does not go near what is needed.

Ms Edel McGinley:

That is really the nub of it.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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It would be a huge help though.

Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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It would be a necessary but not sufficient condition.

Dr. Eileen Culloty:

Just to point out that there are quite a lot of things that are illegal and they still happen online and nothing has been done about that for years. That is the problem we need to solve at a systemic level, not creating a new law that also will not be followed up.

Rónán Mullen (Independent)
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If certain things are legal for adults, they leach out and children are affected through VPNs etc.

Alison Comyn (Fianna Fail)
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I do not have a lot of time so I would like to get a few more points in. What we have discovered here is that this is not a case of one thing to catch all; it is multifaceted. We need to look at legislation and assist with prosecution. We also need to look at societal attitude and change so that these activities are not acceptable any more, people cannot get away with them and they should not be trying to get away with them.

It will not be popular to raise parental responsibility but we need to take these devices out of the hands of babies, toddlers, children and teenagers. We need to see what the consequences are. Somebody has to take responsibility for that. I do not want to tell parents what to do. I hope they will realise it for themselves. I agree that there are very good online platforms but as long as any platform is open to abuse, it should be open to regulation or to being banned. I have learned over the last couple of years that we must listen to victims or survivors, whichever way they want to see themselves. The witnesses listen to victims and survivors every day of the week. If they are using their voice to help them, what is one immediate action that we could take now to make it as safe as possible over the next 12 months? Could they quickly outline what they would do and why?

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I will give the witnesses 30 seconds each.

Ms Niamh McDonald:

Turn off toxic recommender systems by default.

Alison Comyn (Fianna Fail)
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Okay. We have not heard much from Media Literacy Ireland. I would love to hear from it, especially from the point of view of education.

Ms Martina Chapman:

That is it exactly. Legislation has its place. There must be regulation but there will always be new issues emerging and it takes time for legislation and regulation to come through. What we need to do is have an infrastructure whereby we can support people with knowledge, skills, support and guidance so that as new issues emerge, people know where to go for help and support. There is rightly a huge focus on supporting young people and making sure they are protected and there is relevant and appropriate online safety, but let us not forget about the rest of the general public because it is a whole-of-society issue.

It is great if our young people are protected but one day they will not be young people anymore, so we need to look at this much more holistically as well.

Mr. Ciarán O'Connor:

We have talked a lot about regulation and legislation, but to bring it back down to the platforms themselves, every platform - the large ones especially - have very detailed, nuanced, lengthy community guidelines that state what is or is not permitted on the platforms, before we even get to legislation and regulation. What we find too often in our research is a lack of enforcement of their own guidelines or rules. Even though they are very detailed, it takes very little time to find material that is explicitly in violation of their own rules. That itself is a significant failing on the part of platforms.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

From our perspective I welcome the new legislation that is coming online in terms of speeding up our processes. Victims expect as expedient an investigation as possible.

The other point that has been well made here is that this is a multidimensional issue, it is not just a one-size-fits-all kind of scenario. That is an important point to make.

Alison Comyn (Fianna Fail)
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The big message today is that they will not get away with it.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Yes, I think so.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I very much agree with Mr. O'Connor on the point that if the platforms enforce their own self-proclaimed community standards, we would not be dealing with some of these challenges. I am also very conscious that when we talk to the Online Safety Commissioner, who is doing a really good job, the fact that certain platforms are not even signing up to the online safety codes is a problem.

I disagree with my colleague, Deputy Cleere, about banning VPNs. I am certainly not in favour of that. They are certainly very valuable if you end up in a country with a repressive regime.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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To be honest, I do not think it is possible.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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It does speak to the point that, in this discussion, it is critical that the voices of children and young people continue to be heard and that we engage with them on the issues.

There is a really good Young Scientist project from Bunclody Community College on the issue of misinformation and disinformation. Sam Bolger, Thomas Larkin and Aaron Sharlott studied the firehouse effect. It is worth looking at. It is critical to listen to the voices of young people.

My question on keeping up with this technology is primarily for the Garda. First, to what extent do they use AI or other technology in order to be able to identify some of this in terms of gathering evidence and so on? Law enforcement agencies are starting to use it.

The second question relates to one of the challenges around extra-territoriality. If we are dealing with some of the bigger platforms, EU legislation covers this, but during the last term we had a problem with a particular platform, which I will not name - a smaller platform which was essentially a gossip platform with a lot of defamatory material and so on. One of the concerns I have is how we are going to address it if this material ends up being hosted outside of the State and outside of any reasonable jurisdiction.

Mr. Barry Walsh:

The simple answer in respect of AI is that we do not use it, although in terms of looking at the positive possibilities with AI, I do think it has a huge role to play. One of the positive things is that it has the capacity to disseminate a large amount of information in a very efficient and effective manner. A core function of policing is to arrive at the evidence that you need.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Is it under consideration at the moment by the Garda to use it?

Mr. Barry Walsh:

It is not under active consideration. Over time, it is something that will naturally come onto the radar of An Garda Síochána when that is permitted across government. That would be the applicable situation there.

In terms of hosting in particular in regimes that are not susceptible or friendly to requests from the likes of this jurisdiction, unfortunately, that is a complication. The online domain is a global domain. That is the domain An Garda Síochána deals with on a regular basis. It is not a simple domain and there are those complications which, irrespective of what legislation exists, will probably remain. It is about recognising that the content that goes online is there and can be misused. That is a very important message too.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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I again thank the witnesses for their contributions today. I will pick up on some of the comments Ms McDonald made earlier about the algorithms being turned off by default.

I know many people have picked up on that and also on age verification, about which I am very much in Ms McDonald's camp. I do not necessarily see it as a bad thing. It has a role to play. Just as we have over-18s spaces in our physical world, we should have the same in the online world. For me, there are the privacy concerns and all those technical issues around it, but it also leaves behind the cesspit we now know to be the Internet, whereby the rest of us are exposed to the same online harms and issues.

I raised this recently with some witnesses in one of our December meetings and I was somewhat ridiculed for suggesting that we might, for example, consider at some stage the nationalisation of online platforms. I was able to refine that a little further in some of my media contributions afterwards to explain that the point I was making was that, with such a fundamental sum, an algorithm is a maths equation. As was said, algorithms are used to keep our eyes on the screen for the profit of the platforms that control them. My point is that if we had an ability to exert public interest on those algorithms, we could flip the entire online space on its head. We could have it designed to promote social cohesion, lifelong learning, mental health well-being - whatever we choose to do - and allow the tech companies to work within that framework. Is that something the witnesses would ridicule, and do they think that is viable?

Ms McDonald suggested, for example, that they should be turned off by default. That, to me, is a low ambition. I appreciate why she is positioning it in that way, but is there a world in which she thinks we should be aspiring to a much better use? I worked in the Internet space from 2006 to 2014 and it was a time when we were much more excited about what it would do for society. We were still in an open-source space. I am sorry, I will stop talking so I can hear from the witnesses.

Ms Edel McGinley:

It would be lovely to go back to the old days of when the Internet and social media delivered for us all. Maybe there is a world where we can go back to that.

Sinéad Gibney (Dublin Rathdown, Social Democrats)
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On that specific bit about public interest influence on an algorithm, what would that do? Could it work?

Ms Edel McGinley:

Surely, it could do good. I do not know the technical details of that, to be honest, so I would have to examine it a bit more. When we talk about algorithms, it is the design of them. They are designed for engagement and outrage. They promote that engagement. There is much talk about plurality of algorithms and different types of algorithms. We should be looking at that.

Ms Niamh McDonald:

Just to add, we have no eyes on how the companies design the algorithms at present. Previously, we could do research and have a look at the design and architecture of it, but that is not there now. It is in the hands of multibillionaires who are controlling it. That is the big issue we have now. If we could take a step by step process first and then have a discussion about what we want, that would be the most democratic thing we could do right now.

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I have a few last observations. I think we have exhausted the questions. In a previous life, I was an e-business online manager for Fáilte Ireland and Bord Fáilte. I had the privilege of registering ireland.ie, discoverireland.ie and all of these things. That will tell you how far back it was - at the very beginning. I look at the journey from there to now, with a 14- and 15-year-old who will be getting to that age of accessing all of this, and I am scared.

I am scared for adults too. I have had to have conversations with people this week who have been affected by some of this AI stuff. I am going to have another one straight after this meeting. By the way, this goes beyond Government or Opposition and any of that rubbish. This committee decided we were going to do online safety and this issue has arisen on top of that. This could be one of the most important reports any Oireachtas committee has ever done, to make recommendations that will change how we as a country deal with these issues, in a considered way with the safety of children and adults at the forefront of our attention. While I know we are not going to get it all right or perfect, there is certainly a way in which we can influence not just across the EU but potentially across the world.

There is the issue of law. I have a worry about my party colleagues being instrumental in bringing in Coco's Law.

I know about the other legislation from 1998, which was also referred to. I worry there are gaps there and that we could be chasing the likes of X with the 1998 legislation. There are also issues there regarding adults. I am interested in the prosecution and case numbers the witnesses will bring forward. I mean that not to catch them out but to genuinely help us with the legal and regulatory side of things.

Algorithms are an absolute defining issue that has to be dealt with. I agree with Deputy Gibney. We might differ on how we go about it, but it is certainly an issue that has to be dealt with. It is poisonous. You could be on your phone and, if one of your children was near you, you would be afraid of what would come up next automatically. It is sick and it is all profit-generated. These are e-commerce companies at the end of the day. This is about money.

The third thing relates to education. There is some really good work there and lots more can happen. However, the issues of parental and societal responsibility are getting lost here.

There is another thing regarding what we bring forward, which is that it has to be robust. There will be another platform tomorrow and the day after, whatever we do. I am not sure we can wait for European law or regulatory processes to catch up. We have such a diverse Europe at present with different views. If we need to fall foul for the betterment of our own society, as a test case let us do it. Maybe that is where we have to go. Maybe we have to go through a whole process of changing how we deal with these companies, and dare I say it, it may have other impacts on us economically and so forth, but we have to do the right thing.

I thank each and every one of the witnesses. I will now upgrade and say this is the best committee meeting I have had since I have become Chair. None of us as committee members have the absolute answers or any of that. We all work very collegially but we are emboldened by the witnesses' contributions today on where we need to go in our work as a committee. That is because of the effort and time they have made to come in here today, as well as their contributions, answers and frankness. We will continue our discussions with other representatives, people and platforms over the coming weeks and then we will sit down to write a report which will be published. We will also be working with the Department. I hope this will stimulate changes in this country that will have dramatic impact, and I hope those changes will begin this year.

Did someone ask a question?

Ms Edel McGinley:

I ask that the platforms are an open session. Before, when they met with this-----

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I can assure the witnesses that it will be an open session. We will not go through what happened the last time where there was a platform behind closed doors. We may have discussions with some individuals, but they will almost certainly be open as well. We will make those decisions as a committee.

I thank everyone for their attendance here today. We will take a short adjournment before we go into private session. We have some business to discuss ourselves.