Ireland’s national regulatory body, Coimisiún na Meán, responsible for overseeing the implementation of the Digital Services Act (DSA) in Ireland, has prioritized child safety as a focus area for its work in 2025, according to a work program published on Thursday.
At the national level, the regulator said it will ensure that platforms fulfill their obligations to keep children safe online by implementing and enforcing the Online Safety Framework.
Provisions restricting harmful content such as cyberbullying, promotion of self-harm or suicide, promotion of eating disorders, dangerous calls, as well as detailed provisions on age verification and parental controls, come into force in July.
The DSA, which started to apply to all platforms in February 2024, obliges companies to, among other things, comply with the requirements for transparency and integrity of elections.
The European Commission oversees the 25 largest online platforms that have more than 45 million users per month, while national supervisory authorities oversee all platforms below this threshold.
Coimisiún na Meán is the vice-chair of the EU working group that is developing guidelines on child protection under the DSA. These guidelines are expected to be published this year.
“We will continue our involvement in some of the European Commission’s open investigations under the DSA that relate to child-related issues,” the work program states.
The Commission has launched a number of investigations into potential violations of the DSA, but none of these investigations have yet been completed.
Last year, it launched an investigation into Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, as it suspects that their algorithms may encourage behavioral addictions in children, as well as create so-called “rabbit hole effects.”
In addition, the Commission is also concerned about the age verification and verification methods used by Meta.
Last month, a senior Coimisiún na Meán official warned that EU regulators need a common approach to enforcing the rules for online platforms, as the DSA leaves room for interpretation.
