Online Safety

To address the issue of harmful online content on both a national and an international level, the Government put in place a coordinated approach, involving a range of stakeholders including industry, teachers, parents, children and young people. This led to the development of The Action Plan for Online Safety 2018 - 2019.

The objective was to set out and implement actions that would be achievable and have the greatest impact on online safety for everyone in Ireland. A number of progress reports were published.

To implement the Action Plan, the Government developed and enacted the Online Safety and Media Regulation (OSMR) Act and established the National Advisory Council for Online Safety (NACOS).

NACOS operated from October 2018 – November 2023 and served as a forum for non-governmental organisations, industry and academic stakeholders to discuss online safety issues. Further information on the work of NACOS is available here.

Government approved the publication of the OSMR Bill on 12 January 2022. The Bill was initiated in Seanad Éireann on 25 January 2022 and in Dáil Éireann on 11 July 2022 for consideration for enactment. It was signed into law on 10 December 2022 and commenced on 15 March 2023.

The OSMR Act, among other things, provided for:

• the establishment of a multi-person Media Commission (to be known as Coimisiún na Meán)

• the dissolution of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland

• a new regulatory framework for online safety

• the updating of the regulation of television broadcasting and video on-demand services.

The Act empowered An Coimisiún to serve as the national regulatory authority, in accordance with Article 30 of the Audio Visual Media Services Directive (AVMSD), to designate online services for regulation from a pool of relevant online services, and to develop, supervise and enforce binding online safety codes applying to those services.

Those online safety codes will, among other things, seek to minimise the availability of defined categories of harmful online content and provide for standards in relation to the complaints handling processes operated by those services.

Further information on the OSMR Act is available here.

With the commencement of the OSMR Act on 15 March 2023, Coimisiún na Meán was formally established. There are five Commissioners in An Coimisiún:

• Jeremy Godfrey, Executive Chairperson;

• Niamh Hodnett, Online Safety Commissioner;

• Rónán Ó Domhnaill, Media Development Commissioner;

• John Evans, Digital Services Commissioner;

• Aoife MacEvilly, Broadcasting and Video-on-Demand Commissioner.

Further information on Coimisiún na Meán, including its functions, are available on their official website.

The development of a National Counter Disinformation Strategy was a key recommendation from the Future of Media Commission, which called for a more coordinated and strategic approach to combat the damaging impact of disinformation on Irish society and democracy.

The independently chaired multi-stakeholder Working Group tasked with developing the Strategy was established in February 2023. It has met frequently since its establishment and has heard from a range of experts in different fields related to disinformation, as well as conducting a written public consultation and holding a stakeholder consultation event.

Drafting of the strategy is now at an advanced stage and it is intended that it will be finalised as soon as practicable. Further information on the Working Group is available here.