IRELAND\u2019S MEDIA WATCHDOG has launched an investigation over concerns that children can access pornography and violent videos on Elon Musk\u2019s social media platform X.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the first formal investigation that has been launched by Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n under Ireland\u2019s Online Safety Code.<\/p>\n
In a statement, Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n said its platform supervision team raised concerns in relation to the \u201cpotential ineffective implementation of age assurance mechanisms by X\u201d.<\/p>\n
Under the Online Safety Code, age assurance is required on the X platform to ensure that children do not see videos depicting pornography, extreme and gratuitous violence, or acts of cruelty on the platform.<\/p>\n
Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n said there are also \u201cconcerns\u201d that the parental controls put in place by X may not be effective, do not have minimum requirements, are hard to locate and are not brought to the attention of new users at sign-up stage, as required by the Code.<\/p>\n
As the X platform allows adult-only content and also allows children under the age of 16 to use its service, it is required by the Online Safety Code to provide parental control systems to ensure that parents and guardians have control over what type of content their children encounter.<\/p>\n
The investigation will examine whether there are effective age assurance measures in place by X to ensure that adult-only video content cannot normally be seen by children.<\/p>\n
Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n noted that age assurance which is based solely on self-declaration is not considered effective.<\/p>\n
The investigation will also consider whether the parental control systems put in place by X have the minimum functions required under the Code, and whether X appropriately draws the attention of users to the parental control systems they make available.<\/p>\n
The investigation will also examine whether X ensures that its parental control systems are provided as an option to new users on account sign-up.<\/p>\n
John Evans, digital services commissioner at Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n, said children have a \u201cfundamental right to participate in society, which includes the digital world, and to be protected from harm, abuse and exploitation online\u201d.<\/p>\n
He added that Ireland\u2019s Online Safety Code focused on \u201cprotecting children from illegal and harmful content online and ensuring that parents and guardians had stronger methods to shape their children\u2019s online experiences\u201d.<\/p>\n
Evans remarked that platforms which are accessible to children and allow adult-only video content must \u201censure that this content cannot normally be accessed by children by implementing effective age assurance measures\u201d.<\/p>\n
He noted that this marks Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n\u2019s first investigation under the Online Safety Code.<\/p>\n
If a platform is found in violation of the Online Safety Code, Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n can apply an administrative financial sanction, including a fine of up to 10% of relevant annual turnover, or \u20ac20 million, whichever is greater.\n<\/p>\n
Other investigations<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, in addition to today\u2019s investigation into X, An Coimisi\u00fan has also opened five other investigations into platforms that are established in Ireland under the EU Digital Services Act.<\/p>\n
These investigations have been opened into X, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram.<\/p>\n
This separate investigation into X is in relation to the rights of users to appeal content moderation decisions relating to Terms and Conditions.<\/p>\n
The investigations into TikTok and LinkedIn are in relation to the platforms illegal content reporting mechanisms.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the investigations into Facebook and Instagram are in relation to \u201cdark patterns and the ability of users to choose a recommender system not based on profiling\u201d.<\/p>\n
Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n is also involved in four joint investigations which have been opened by the European Commission.<\/p>\n
This includes two joint investigations into TikTok, one of which in respect of suspected non-compliance related to the protection of minors, and the other in relation to suspected systemic risks to election integrity in the context of the Romanian presidential elections.<\/p>\n
Another joint investigation relates to X and \u201csuspected systemic risks in respect of its deployment of Grok\u201d.<\/p>\n
The fourth joint investigation with the European Commission is into Shein and in relation to suspected non-compliance on the sale of illegal products, addictive design and recommender system transparency.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"IRELAND\u2019S MEDIA WATCHDOG has launched an investigation over concerns that children can access pornography and violent videos on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":618958,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,3584,605,1712,61,60,262654,58,606],"class_list":["post-618957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-coimisiun-na-mean","tag-elon-musk","tag-european-commission","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-online-safety-code","tag-social-media","tag-x"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/618957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=618957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/618957\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/618958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=618957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=618957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=618957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}