Government set to confirm plans for under-16s social media ban

According to reports, the plan will heavily focus on online safety with new legislation on the way to restrict under-16s from accessing social media.

The first step will be a pilot run of an age verification tool which will involve a number of young people testing it out to see how it would work in practice.

The strategy will also push for ongoing reviews of existing legislation to address certain AI technologies used to intimidate and harass.

Speaking about the upcoming changes, Digital Rights Ireland chairperson TJ McIntyre said he views this as worrying and that it represents a "lack of joined-up thinking".

Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, he said: "This is something that has gone off on what is essentially the whim of the executive without any prior consultation. I would be very concerned that the whole thing is starting off rather half-cocked.”

Dr McIntyre went on to say that it would be very hard to legislate for age restrictions on under-16s if a form of government identification would be needed to gain access to social media apps.

"The talk of doing this unilaterally is already, I think, very unrealistic. This is something that can be done, if at all, only at an EU level," he said.

"The difficulty with that is that the Data Protection Commission has already determined on two separate occasions that aspects of the Public Services Card scheme are illegal", and that "there doesn't seem to have been any thought given to the actual practicalities of age verification in this context."