Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 15 December 2020
260. Deputy Holly Cairns asked the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media if the online safety and media regulation Bill will contain specific mention of image-based sexual abuse and online harassment; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [43586/20]
View answerThe Online Safety and Media Regulation Bill is designed to tackle the spread and amplification of defined categories of harmful online content. It will do this by providing for regulatory oversight by an Online Safety Commissioner of the systems that online services use to deliver and moderate user-generated content. This will include a compliance and enforcement framework of binding online safety codes, investigation and audit powers and sanctions for non-compliance.
The Bill is designated to be as future proofed as possible. One of the ways it will do this is by providing for a category of harmful content that comprises "material which it is a criminal offence to disseminate”. This means that rather than specifically set out particular pieces of criminal legislation that are encompassed in this category, all such legislation is included in the scope of this Bill. As additional offences are enacted that relate to the dissemination of criminal content, such legislation will also come within scope without the need to constantly amend the Online Safety and Media Regulation Bill.
Therefore, while the legislation does not specifically refer to image based sexual abuse material and online harassment, the category of "material which it is a criminal offence to disseminate" does encompass the following:
- S. 5 of the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act 1998, regarding the dissemination of child sex abuse materials, and,
- S. 10 of Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act, 1997, regarding the offence of harassment.
The Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences (HHCRO) Bill, 2017, proposes to introduce new criminal offences regarding image based abuse and online harassment and to update the offence of harassment in s. 10 of the 1997 Act. The HHCRO Bill is due to be enacted shortly and its provisions will then also come within scope of this Bill.
In all cases, An Garda Síochána will remain the appropriate authority to investigate individual instances of criminal material online and refer alleged perpetrators for prosecution by the Director of Public Prosecutions. What the Online Safety and Media Regulation Bill will do is ensure that there is appropriate oversight of the systems that designated online services have in place to deal with such content.
