John Connolly (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
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168. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality his assessment of the operation and impact of the Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Act 2020; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24785/25]

Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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The Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Act 2020, also known as Coco’s Law, was enacted in 2021.

This Act provides for offences relating to the recording, distribution or publication of intimate images and for the anonymity of victims of those offences; and for an offence involving the distribution, publication or sending of threatening or grossly offensive communications.

It addresses the distribution or publication of an intimate image without consent with intent to cause harm to the victim. The Act makes it an offence to threaten to distribute or publish such an image. It also provides for a strict liability offence to engage in the recording, distribution or publication of an intimate image without consent, with no requirement to prove an intention to cause harm.

An operational review of the legislation, published in Autumn 2024, carried out by my Department, found positive early indicators in terms of prosecutions taken, the number of reports of intimate image abuse made, and general awareness of the legislation. While the review concluded that it was too soon to make sweeping generalisations, particularly as it can take some time for cases to proceed through the system, it is clear from this review that the legislation has had a beneficial impact three years after commencement.

There was a highly successful awareness campaign carried out by my Department following the enacting of the legislation. The review into the operation of the Act noted independent research from August 2021 which found that 69% thought it was against the law to share intimate images without consent, and 51% thought it was against the law to threaten to share intimate images. A follow up piece of research conducted in November 2023 found that those figures had jumped to 97% and 96%, after a public awareness campaign.

As part of the awareness campaign, the Department of Justice partnered with Hotline.ie to provide a widely accessible reporting mechanism for victims of intimate image abuse. Once illegal content is reported to Hotline, their experts assess the report and decide on next steps.

Any online service provider served by Hotline.ie with an intimate image abuse notice is responsible for removing the content at source.

The review found that, between September 2021 and December 2023, almost 1,500 reports were made to Hotline.ie which, after assessment, were found to be intimate image abuse.

Some 1,006 of these were images or videos shared without the person’s consent via publicly accessible web-locations and Hotline.ie was able to get 92% removed.

Hotline.ie also received more than 400 reports relating to threats to share intimate images. This included 366 cases of sexual extortion and 27 threats to share intimate images for harassment purposes.

The review found that the Office of Director of Public Prosecutions had taken a total of 99 cases in respect of section 2, 3 or 4 of the Act between its commencement and the end of 2023.

This included:

• A total of 23 cases prosecuted on indictment in the Circuit Court
• The DPP consented to summary disposal on guilty plea for eight cases
• The DPP directed summary disposal on 68 cases
• One case was prosecuted on indictment in the Central Criminal Court.