A ban on social media for teenagers, which has been brought forward in plans in Australia, is something that you "can’t enforce" in Ireland, a tech expert has suggested.
Australia is adding YouTube to sites covered by its world-first ban on social media for teenagers - reversing an earlier decision to exempt the website.
YouTube argued it should not be classified as social media because its main activity is hosting videos.
Technology Editor with the Irish Independent Adrian Weckler told Behind the Story young teenagers are getting on social media with the help of their parents.
"What’s happening now in Australia and other countries, including Ireland, is more about a signal – you can’t actually enforce this," he said.
"The reason you can’t enforce it, and the reason we know this for a fact in Ireland, is despite the fact that it has been against all of the rules for under-13s to access social media in Ireland - according to the platform’s own rules - we know that about 70% of under-13s in Ireland have social media accounts.
"That’s because the parents help set it up for them."
Read more: Australia widens teen social media ban to YouTube
Mr Weckler said he believes other countries will try and replicate the Australian example.
"We know from Niamh Hodnett, the Online Safety Commissioner here, she has said that Coimisiún na Meán is watching very closely what the Australians do on this," he said.
"If this move in Australia works - if they can enforce it to some degree - that would be seen as a huge win and other regulators around the world will probably try to follow suit."
Mr Wecker said Artificial Intelligence is also being used to find ways of cheating the system.
"In the UK what’s happening is that kids are using selfies and facials of video game characters to fool the systems," he explained.
"The quality and the realism from AI will freak you out, will freak everyone out - it’s freaking me out.
"Not only is it enough to get past the controls in place for live selfies that Coimisiún na Meán or Ofcom [in the UK] have - or probably the Australians too - but it probably will unlock a whole lot of new disinformation.
"I don’t see what we can do about that right now."
Mr Weckler said the popularity of YouTube is actually overtaking linear television.
"A Nielsen report out of the US two weeks ago showed that YouTube is now the most-watched thing on television sets in the US - it has overtaken Netflix," he told Fran and Evelyn.
"You could probably extrapolate similar figures over this side of the Atlantic."
Evelyn and Fran also discuss the economics of buying an EV and whether the cost of charging them is scaring potential customers away.
You can listen to Behind the Story which is available on the RTÉ Radio Player.
You can also find episodes on Apple here, or on Spotify here.
