Mark Zuckerberg apologises to families at hearing

The hearing also featured testimony from X’s Linda Yaccarino, TikTok’s Shou Zi Chew, Snap’s Evan Spiegel and Discord’s Jason Citron. All came under fierce questioning from both sides of the political spectrum.

But the session was particularly disastrous for Mr Zuckerberg, who has recently attempted to rehabilitate his image. He also faced accusations from Republicans that he had lied previously to Congress about the harm done by his platforms.

“Mr Zuckerberg, you and the companies before us – I know you don’t mean it to be so – but you have blood on your hands,” said Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina senator and the committee’s top Republican, in his opening remarks, prompting applause from those gathered. “You have a product that’s killing people.”

The hearing comes as Congress considers several proposed pieces of federal legislation that target the Silicon Valley groups, such as the Kids Online Safety Act, which requires platforms to protect children from online harms.

However, the Senate and the House have so far failed to find consensus on the precise measures that should be taken. Bills such as the Kids Online Safety Act have faced pushback from technology platforms and the trade groups that represent them.

During the hearing, the executives gave a mixed response to the series of proposals. Mr Zuckerberg called for legislators instead to mandate regulation requiring Apple and Google app stores to verify the age of younger users. He reiterated the long-standing assertion that the platform had introduced numerous tools and features to protect children.

In her opening statement, Ms Yaccarino insisted that X, formerly known as Twitter, was “not the platform of choice for children and teens”, and “does not have a line of business dedicated to children”.

But she and Mr Spiegel won plaudits for their open support of the Kids Online Safety Act.

This stood in contrast to an exchange with Mr Citron, who baulked when asked by Senator Graham if the gaming-focused chat messaging group supported the various proposed pieces of legislation, such as the Stop CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Material) Act, one by one. Mr Citron avoided answering in the affirmative, prompting Senator Graham to state: “If you’re waiting on these guys to solve the problem, we’re going to die waiting.”

Discord’s Jason Citron, TikTok’s Shou Zi Chew, X’s Linda Yaccarino, and Mark Zuckerberg. Bloomberg

Mr Chew also avoided committing to some of the bills, but insisted that the company expected to invest more than $US2 billion ($3 billion) in trust and safety efforts this year.

He repeatedly faced accusations from some Republican senators that TikTok shared data with Beijing and represented a national security risk, given its Chinese parent, ByteDance. Mr Chew denied TikTok shared data.

In one rare moment of consensus, the chief executives all suggested they were open to the idea of a federal regulatory agency focused on tech and social media.

Ahead of the sessions, legislators released internal documents and emails showing that Mr Zuckerberg had rejected requests from global affairs head Nick Clegg in 2021 to increase staff levels to bolster its efforts on child safety.

Meta said the emails showed requests to expand existing wellbeing teams, adding: “The cherry-picked documents do not provide the full context of how the company operates or what decisions were made.”

Meta had already been singled out recently, with the US state of New Mexico filing a lawsuit in December arguing the platform failed to remove child sexual abuse material from its platforms, and was a “prime location for predators”.

The accusations followed an undercover, months-long investigation in which the attorney-general created “decoy accounts” posing as children aged 14 and under.

A Wall Street Journal investigation also found that its algorithms facilitated the creation of a network to buy and sell underage sex content. Meta said at the time that it had improved its proactive detection of potentially suspicious groups.

“Their design choices, their failures to adequately invest in trust and safety, and their constant pursuit of engagement and profit over basic safety have all put our kids and grandkids at risk,” Senator Dick Durbin, the committee’s Democratic chairman, said of the platforms on Wednesday.

Financial Times