Social Media
Dail Éireann — 2026-03-03
============================================================

Patrick O'Donovan (FG), Limerick County

The Government's position on the issue of restricting access to social media platforms for children under 16 years of age is set out in the Government's recently published national digital and AI strategy. The Government is committed to working closely with like-minded European Union member states on proposals to restrict social media access for children and young people. In addition, the European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, announced an expert panel to examine the issue and any decision will take account of this report. This reflects the Government's view that a decision at EU would be preferable.
However, as set out in the strategy, Ireland will also take action domestically if necessary. The European Union member states are examining questions of prohibiting access by children and young people to social medial platforms and some are taking steps to do so, including France, which is debating legislation to restrict access to social media for under-15s. Australia is implementing such a measure in respect of under-16s and other jurisdictions are considering similar measures. However, across the European Union there are different views on whether there should be a digital age of majority, and if there was such an age, what that age should be and whether it should be an outright ban or a ban subject to parental consent.
Notwithstanding the international debate on the age of majority, I am of the view that age verification is a vital part of the picture in providing real assurance that children are the age they claim to be and to ensure they are not exposed to harmful or illegal content. Without robust age verification, any other measures including implementing a digital age of majority will not work. That is why my officials are working with the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer on an age verification tool as part of Ireland's digital wallet in support of the implementation of Ireland's online safety code. This wallet will be voluntary for people to hold and the tool will be voluntary for users and platforms to avail of. A pilot is envisaged to be led by the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer and will be voluntary and will run for a number of months. Feedback from the pilot will inform the shape of the initiative but while doing so we will ensure interoperability and respect users' rights, including data protection.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-03-03/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:02+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-03-03