Martin: We will raise the digital age of consent
Breakthrough in battle for child protection
FIANNA Fáil and Sinn Féin are to join forces to oppose the Government’s plan to set the digital age of consent at 13.
This is the age at which young people can sign up for online services – including social media sites and accounts – without needing the explicit approval of their parents.
It is also the age at which technology giants like Facebook can legally retain their data.
The main Opposition parties want this age of consent raised to 16 in a step forward for children’s online safety.
Ministers intend to set the digital age of consent at the lowest possible age – 13 years – despite cyber security experts warning it would allow social media firms to gather information about young children, including where they live. But Fianna Fáil has told the Irish Daily Mail it will ‘put down an amendment to the Data Protection Bill at committee stage in order to amend the age of digital consent from 13 to 16’.
Jim O’Callaghan, the party’s justice spokesman, said: ‘Fianna Fáil believes that children should be protected as much as possible from data profiling and commercial targeting. There are many benefits for children in having access to online information but we must also recognise that society has a responsibility to protect children’s privacy and to ensure their data is not easily commodified for commercial purposes.’
He said this decision was reached after a ‘very thorough discussion’ on the issue by the party’s senior TDs.
‘More responsibility needs to be placed on social media companies to ensure our children’s privacy is further protected and that their data is not harvested unwittingly for commercial gain,’ he added.
Sinn Féin also supports raising the digital age of consent to 16. A party spokesman said: ‘Sinn Féin support the raising of the digital age of consent to 16. We are currently drafting our amendments to the Data Protection Bill, one of which would involve the prohibition of targeting of under-18s for data gathering and micro-targeted advertisement.’
Labour has already confirmed it would seek to increase to 16 years old. Seán Sherlock, the party’s justice spokesman, said recent controversies demonstrate the need to protect children online’.
He said: ‘If we were to set the digital age of consent for Ireland at 16 it would be in line with Germany, the Netherlands, France, and others, who have best-inclass approaches to protecting children online.
‘This is not about when children can go online or use devices rather it only relates to situations where the processing of the personal data of a child is performed.
‘The Bill at present sets the Irish digital age of consent at the lowest possible age – 13 years – and I believe it should be set at 16.’
In the Dáil last week Mr Sherlock noted that a Seanad amendment had previously provided for this age limit to be reviewed after three years.
But he said the Bill as it stands contains provisions to give 13year-olds ‘the capacity to sign away their personal data, even though for the next five years of their lives they will be the subject of special protective codes because in the eyes of the law they are still children’.
‘It is a contradiction in terms,’ he added.
Fine Gael senator Catherine Noone has already challenged her own Government policy by calling for the digital age of consent to be raised to 16, bringing it in line with other European countries.
‘Children have to be protected’
ONE of the many feeble and unfounded excuses that politicians trot out in relation to the important issue of children and smartphone control is that it is a matter for parents alone to address.
Why should this be just for parents? For when it comes to other issues of societal concern, that is patently not the case.
Otherwise we would have youngsters drinking alcohol in pubs, placing bets on the races at Punchestown, and buying cigarettes in their local Spar as and when their own parents considered it appropriate, rather than at an age deemed suitable by the State.
So such an excuse ignores the fundamental way in which society operates for the protection of children. What it also ignores is the fact that the issue of smartphone usage is tearing families apart.
A new survey concludes that 83% of parents find that smartphones are the biggest issue of dispute at home – and the cause of arguments between parents and children for 40% of the time that they are together. These figures endorse the view that it is not good enough to leave parents alone to stand up for what’s right.
Parents cannot cope with this neverending battle and inevitably, through no fault of their own, many feel they must give in, even when it goes against what they feel is best for their children.
Throwing the responsibility back on to parents is political cowardice: a dereliction of duty by our legislatislators.
In that vein, it is good to see Fianna Fáil choosing to stand up for what is right.
Firstly the party spoke out in favour of a nationwide school smartphone ban, and now it has taken another massive step as it seeks to have the digital age of consent raised from 13 to 16.Labour and Sinn Féin have taken the same position, making it more likely that this necessary adjustment will be seen through.
Once again, however, this is not a solution to the overall problem – but rather a significant step in the right direction.
The digital age of consent is not the age at which children can be online: it is, effectively, the age at which they can use social media. (In truth, it is the age at which children can consent to having their data harvested online: but as social media firms rely on such data harvesting to pay their bills, its practical application is to make it unlawful for a child to sign up to such services without a parent’s approval).
This step will is finally place a strong legal responsibility on the social media companies to ensure that users are of the age. they are supposed to be: until now, the billionaire social media businesses have have simply washed their hands of accountability when it comes to verifying that children are actually the age they say they are.
This new initiative will force the companies to step up to the plate. Those that don’t must expect to face severe penalties. It is yet another powerful vindication of this newspaper’s campaign to protect our children online.
Hopefully this move to raise the digital age of consent will have a number of other positive effects as well. Firstly, parents will realise that young children should not be on social media at all – and that social media can cause them immense psychological and emotional damage.
Secondly, there is the logical conclusion that if children are not permitted on social media, then their main argument for needing a smartphone is simply void. If they can’t access any social media apps by law, then an old-fashioned phone will do.
And thirdly, it is to be hoped that we will now finally see all our legislators find the political courage to stand up and insist that children need to be protected and that that protection falls under the remit, not just of parents and teachers – but of the national parliament too.