Minister for Justice Jim O'Callaghan has warned that online pornography is increasingly being accessed by younger people and "is distorting their perception of human sexuality".
Launching the annual report of One in Four, a specialist support service for adult survivors of child sexual abuse, Mr O'Callaghan said the content appeared to be more violent and aggressive.
"In respect of younger people, it is distorting their perception of human sexuality," he warned.
The minister said that, as a consequence, there was greater violence in sexual assaults reported recently.
There is a responsibility, he said, to ensure that the misrepresentative view is not accepted by the public.
One in Four described its strategic plan for 2025-2029, launched today, as a blueprint for protecting children and said it was developed "to reduce the prevalence of child sexual abuse and to effect systemic change".
"There is no doubt online pornography has a huge impact on kids' emotional wellbeing and we don't want to see us repeating the patterns of the past, Chief Executive Deirdre Kenny said.
"We have not held institutions to account like schools, like the church, and unfortunately we're repeating that pattern if we don't stand up to the pornography industry, to online platforms that don't protect our children."
Record number of males seeking support
The annul report shows that the number of male survivors of sexual abuse who sought support from One in Four reached an all-time high last year.
The figure rose from 48% in 2023 to 62% in 2024.
The increase follows the publication of the Scoping Inquiry Report into Historical Sexual Abuse in Schools in September 2024.
The inquiry found that there were 2,395 allegations of sexual abuse in respect of 308 schools run by religious orders.
The Commission of Investigation into the Handling of Historical Child Sexual Abuse in Schools - established in response to the findings - is undertaking preliminary work to establish its structures and processes.
Ms Kenny said the public conversation and the visibility of the Scoping Inquiry helped create an environment in which survivors - especially men - felt able to seek support.
It represented "not just statistics, but real people breaking years, sometimes decades, of silence," she said.
Speaking on RTE's Morning Ireland, Ms Kenny said the issue is getting worse.
"It takes a toll on peoples' mental health, their physical wellbeing, relationships. It takes a toll on our society, peoples' ability to work, to have healthy relationships, and I think the sad issue is that we see the opportunity for prevention. This issue is not inevitable, we can prevent it.
"I think our rising numbers, and certainly the CSO's numbers in terms of this issue, is getting worse, not better. It's closer to one in three, than one in four now. Its time that we really invested in prevention."
Ms Kenny said that a coordinated approach is needed.
"We have a commission now that will look at decades of abuse in our schools, but I think we often react to the shock of this issue and we don't really think strategically about how we can manage it into the future.
"I think we need to look at evidence-based prevention. We need collective action, we need to look at the risk that children face now online, for instance, and have robust measures to help protect children."
Minister O'Callaghan said he was determined to have a justice system that was fit for purpose and gave victims the confidence to report an offence, knowing they would be treated with respect.
He said that a zero tolerance strategy is being brought forward by the Government to combat all forms of domestic, sexual and gender-based violence backed by an €80 million investment in Budget 2026.
Contacts with One in Four increased by 17% from 2023 to 2024 with 7,674 support sessions delivered to 1,292 individuals last year, according to the annual report.
The percentage of females who used the service was 37%, while non-binary accounted for 1%.
One in Four offers advocacy, therapy and prevention programmes as well as family psychoeducation groups.
Its advocacy service equips survivors to navigate legal, institutional, and other formal systems with trusted, trauma-focused support.
The number of requests for this type of support rose by 21% in 2024 to 5,461.
A total of 44% of these were based in Dublin and 45% in the rest of Ireland, while 6% were international and 5% unknown.
Training sessions to frontline professionals, including lawyers and support workers, were delivered by the organisation last year to share expertise to survivors of child sexual abuse.
The sessions aimed to ensure that those at the forefront of services "are well-equipped" to provide compassionate, effective support.
The report also notes that One in Four ran a pilot project in Neurofeedback Therapy (NFT).
The "empirically supported approach" described as "safe and non-invasive" supports the brain, impacted by trauma, to self-regulate "by moving towards more calm and relaxed patterns of electrical activity".
A total of 211 sessions were delivered to four clients and three staff volunteers, supported by 56 hours of expert clinical supervision provided by international experts Boston Neurodynamics.
"We were encouraged by the initial results and are delighted to be able to offer NFT as a service," the report stated.
