A Joint Oireachtas Committee has called for the appointment of a Digital Safety Commissioner to improve internet safeguards for children and young adults.
That is one of the recommendations in the committee’s report that also urges the introduction of a series of new laws to ban a number of online offences.
Offences identified include online harassment and stalking, the distribution of threatening, false, indecent or obscene messages and the distribution of intimate images without the consent of the person depicted.
The study, carried out by the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Children and Youth Affairs, began early last year and focused on a number of key areas of digital safety for young people.
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The aim of the probe was to explore how children and young people can be active participants online and benefit from the positives the internet has to offer, while at the same time remain protected.
Its public hearings saw the committee consult with a wide range of children's charities, legal and cyber-security experts and social media companies.
Due to be published later this morning, the committee's report says a clearer regulatory framework and governance structure is needed to ensure children and young people are adequately protected.
As a result, it says the remaining recommendations contained in the Internet Content Governance Advisory Group of 2014 should be implemented without delay.
The group also found that a commissioner is needed to take on a variety of roles, including coordinating the activities of government in the area of digital safety.
It wants to see the development of a robust age verification system and an effective and efficient take down procedure for harmful cyber-communications that is underpinned by statutory powers.
The committee says that following its interactions with Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat it was concerned about how social media firms verify their users' age when they are setting up an account.
The report concludes self-verification of age online is not a robust system.
It also says the commissioner's office should be provided with sufficient resources and personnel to ensure that it can perform its functions adequately.
An advisory task force to provide independent advice and guidance to the commissioner is also called for by the committee.
It would sit across the four relevant departments and also have members from the telecommunications industry, the academic sector, the charitable sector and social media.
Children and young people themselves should also be consulted, it says.
All of this should be underpinned, the committee states, by a national strategy on children's cyber safety, which would detail the Government's plans to address and resource the issues around cyber safety.
A range of recommendations are also made around public awareness and education.
A national communications and public awareness campaign on cyber safety directed at children, young people and their parents is required, the committee claims.
It would highlight potential risks that come with using the internet and what one can do if adversely affected by online content, the report says.
Both primary and post-primary schools should also encourage and accommodate peer-to-peer workshops on cyber safety and appoint trained and supported teachers as "digital safety ambassadors", the investigation concludes.
While schools and local libraries should be encouraged and supported to host parents' education and awareness evenings on cyber safety, it also suggests, with some presentations given by children.
It also recommends the establishment of a properly resourced cyber safety programme for inclusion on the curriculum in both primary and post-primary schools.
The committee says cyber safety education should form a mandatory part of both primary and post-primary teacher training courses.
Children and young people's "right to be forgotten" should also be clearly explained to them, the document states.
Committee chairman Alan Farrell said it had been hearing evidence since February 2017, which points to the "crucial need" to appoint a Digital Safety Commissioner.
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, he said the recommendation to appoint a commissioner follows similar proposals from both the Law Reform Commission and the Special Rapporteur on Child Protection Geoffrey Shannon.
Deputy Farrell said speaking to school children who presented to the committee was "eye opening" especially in relation to teenagers sharing images they should not be sharing.
He said that while the internet is a tremendous resources for education and socialising, children and teenagers need to be aware of the dangers it poses and parents, guardians and teachers also need to be educated.
