INTO president joins calls for action on social media platform X

Increasing pressure is being put on the Government to take action against social media platform X, with the Cork-born president of the Irish National Teachers’ Organisation and local councillors calling for greater regulation.

After Women’s Aid’s announcement that it will no longer have a presence on X, INTO president Anne Horan said: “As Women’s Aid has highlighted, the platform now facilitates the creation and sharing of AI-generated deepfakes, non-consensual intimate imagery, and the production of child sexual abuse material through X’s own AI system, Grok. The circulation of this harmful content, much of which is in breach of the platform’s own rules, endangers children and young people as well as adults, with potentially devastating consequences for children’s mental health.”

The INTO made the decision to cease use of X in December 2024 in the Republic of Ireland, the union in the North following suit last summer. The union’s account is inactive since but has been retained in order to ensure no bad actors attempt to take ownership of the organisation’s name, handle, and identity.

“The majority of INTO’s membership is female. It is utterly unacceptable that legislators have failed to act decisively against a platform that is now facilitating the spread of illegal sexual material, including non-consensual intimate imagery and child sexual abuse material.

“We are calling for immediate government action to prevent further harm to citizens."

The union will convene a roundtable next week with online safety experts to “better understand the scale of harm arising from the erosion of online safety standards and weak regulation”, she said. 

“This will inform our ongoing work to hold governments and regulators to account for failures to guarantee online safety.”

Green Party councillor for Cork City South East, Honore Kamegni announced yesterday that he would join colleague Oliver Moran in withdrawing from the platform. “Over the past three years, I have personally experienced sustained abuse on X including racism, harassment, and climate denial, but this recent development represents an entirely new and deeply disturbing category. It is something I can no longer be associated with,” said Mr Kamegni.

He called for action from government and regulators. “There are serious questions to be asked about where we are going as a society when a company that controls such a large share of public discourse can descend to this level with what appears to be near impunity,” he said.