‘Clear that social media site X not interested’ in sorting online hate – Martin

It is “clear that social media site X isn’t interested” in sorting out hate issues online, Tanaiste Micheal Martin has said.

The Foreign Affairs and Defence minister said that the effect of smartphones and social media on children is “the public health threat of our time”.

The Fianna Fail leader made the comments on his “In Conversation with” podcast this week.

His guest on the podcast, immunologist Professor Luke O’Neill, said that technology could be used in the future to protect young people online – suggesting facial recognition technology could block people aged under 18 from accessing certain sites.

Mr Martin said that “similar” to Big Tobacco when the smoking ban was introduced, the “big challenge is: do companies really want to do that?”

During a meeting with Education Minister Norma Foley in February, social media giants refused a request for greater controls on age verification and phone network companies refused to support a call to parents to not buy smartphones for primary school children.

During that meeting, the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter, did not attend.

“My worry is what damage has been done before we actually get around to resolving some of this,” Mr Martin said of children’s activity online.

“Companies tell me that they are working on all sorts of technological approaches to weed out the hate stuff more frequently.

“The problem is you get some actors now on social media – like, it’s clear to me that X isn’t going to be interested in sorting any of this out. Their model is heading in one direction.

“Nonetheless, the others at least are engaging with society and community to say ‘how can we do this better’.”

He said it suggested a cautionary approach should be taken on the use of artificial intelligence (AI), arguing that it should be embraced but with “guard rails up to protect people”.

Coimisiun na Mean, the newly established Irish regulator for broadcasters and online media, will be able to issue fines of up to 20 million euro or 10% of turnover if certain guidelines are broken.

Speaking on his podcast, Micheal Martin said that his interest in health issues came not only from serving as health minister from 2000-2004, but also from his father.

He said his father’s parents died when he was aged 14 or 15, and as a result he “had a passion for how we live longer”.

“So that idea of longevity and lifespan and so on, I’ve always been interested in,” he added.