Malcolm Byrne (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Cathaoirleach for selecting my matter. Being in this Chamber feels like one's first day in school. Obviously, I am very happy to pose the first matter here to my Wexford colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Browne. My matter focuses on data and data protection.I am a strong advocate for the effective use of data in terms of how it can inform public policy, but it also has the potential to grow into being a multi-billion euro industry in Ireland.

There are serious concerns however, about the potential misuse of data or the abuse of social media. These range from cyberbullying - a number of Senators here are aware of the so-called "Coco's law" which I hope will pass through the Oireachtas quite soon - to economic damage that can be caused by the misuse of data, such as the problems around surveillance capitalism and, as we have seen with the likes of Cambridge Analytica, a threat to democracy itself. As we are quite fortunate in Ireland to have so many of the social media giants located here and because we have so many data centres located here and we want data centres to continue to locate here, Ireland and our Data Protection Commissioner are right at the heart of all of the decisions that have to be made around these issues.

Last year, the Data Protection Commission, DPC, dealt with 10,000 individual cases. Some of these were quite small, but when it comes to data breaches, it can have a significant impact on the individuals concerned. In the past year, the number of breaches of data protection regulations trebled. Clearly, there remains a big problem in terms of the number of data breaches.

In addition to all those individual cases, the DPC here is now dealing with considerable global issues that are featuring on national and international news media. We are looking at, for instance, the fallout of the Schrems II judgment. We are also now seeing the face-off with Facebook. Obviously, I do not want the Minister of State to talk about the looming High Court case, but those kinds of cases will arise more frequently. We are looking at issues around micro-targeting by some of these companies and the lack of transparency in that area. There is the question as to whether or not the DPC will now have to regulate TikTok, if TikTok is based here. I have significant problems around TikTok. I do not propose to start to use it in this Chamber, but TikTok uses facial recognition and machine learning and it is owned by a company in which the Chinese Government has a significant share, and we have to ask what is purpose of the data that will be harvested by that company.

There are responsibilities on the DPC with regard to children's data and the specific category around children's rights and the harvesting of children's data, and around digital literacy which is about making all of us aware as citizens about what is happening in the area of artificial intelligence, AI, algorithmic decision-making and data privacy.

In the context of all that, the DPC has 150 staff. This is not a criticism of the staff but there is a serious shortage, given the scale of what it had to address, of the necessary legal investigators and technologies. It is not only about getting data protection lawyers. There is a need increasingly for administrative lawyers, corporate lawyers and competition lawyers. It is the range of skills that are available to the DPC.

There has to be, and there is, an obligation on the DPC to uphold the effectiveness of the data protection provisions. That means that the DPC has to be properly resourced. It is my view - the EU and the Government may need to start considering this - we need to look at limiting the market dominance in the area of data harvesting by a smaller number of global players. There is a role around digital literacy for all of us but that is also as important for us as legislators, and for others within the public service, because many people do not understand the challenges we face in this area.

I want it noted on the record that we have 150 staff in the DPC's office who are responsible effectively for overseeing the regulation of the data of half a billion European citizens. As I said, data represents a considerable opportunity for Ireland, but if we do not handle this properly and if we do not properly resource the DPC, over the next decade this will represent the biggest risk to Ireland's reputation.