Facebook child safety measures must be introduced in Ireland, says Carberry

Fine Gael MEP Nina Carberry has said that Facebook must extend new child safety measures to Ireland. 

On Wednesday, it was announced that Facebook agreed to a major settlement, totalling in the billions, with US states over the negative impacts social media apps have on children.

Under the agreement, Facebook and Instagram will introduce daily time limits for teenagers, restrict night-time usage, and increase parental controls.

Carberry said that Ireland and the European Union must follow suit in introducing similar measures for children.

The Midlands-North-West MEP said that Facebook and Instagram were designed to get children addicted, and this has now been proven in a court of law..

“The new protections – including daily time limits and stronger parental controls – are very welcome,” she said.

“But so far, Facebook has only agreed to introduce them in America; these safeguards cannot stop at the US border. Children and families here deserve the same protection,” she said.

Carberry said she would be pushing the European Commission to make sure similar measures are introduced in Ireland.

Earlier this week, Fianna Fáil MEP Barry Andrews said that a temporary ban on TikTok “cannot be ruled out,” as the video app has come under fire for its role in the M9 tragedy.

Research conducted by the Dublin People Group set up a “dummy” Facebook account, did not like or engage any content, and yet it was fed far-right, anti-immigrant, anti-LGBTQ+ content.

Our investigation and our analysis of Facebook’s role in modern Irish society can be read here.

The inconvenient truth about Dublin’s tech companies