Zuckerberg apologizes to parents of abuse victims but says networks do not affect mental health

The executive director of Meta, Marco Zuckerbergchurches Excuse me to a group of relatives who say their children were victims of sexual abuse because of Internetbut denied that the use of social networks harms the mental health of minors.

He said this during a hearing United States Senatein which the CEOs of Snap also testified, X (Twitter)Discord and Tick ​​tock to analyze the actions that the technology giants carry out stop child sexual abuse on their platforms.

Zuckerberg defended Meta from accusations of abuse, underlining it there is no scientific proof linking the use of social networks with worse mental health.

“A recent report from the National Academies of Sciences, which evaluated more than 300 studiesdoes not allow us to conclude that social networks cause changes in the mental health of adolescents,” said the director of Meta.

A statement that caused a stir among public opinion, in which the relatives of the victims of harassment on social networks were present, to whom Zuckerberg ended up publicly asking for forgivenessat the request of the deputies.

Mark Zuckerberg apologized in the US Senate

“I’m sorry for everything you went through.”the Meta leader said, adding that no one should have to suffer something like this “terrible” situation.

Republican senator Lindsey Graham accused Zuckerberg of having “hands stained with blood” because social networks are “dangerous products that are destroying human lives and threatening democracy itself”.

In their speeches, the five witnesses recognized their responsibility to keep their communities safe, which is why they were willing to work on this issue and collaborate with legislators.

But when asked about their support for the bills they promoted, none of them answered clearly, so the deputies punished their “deadly silence”.

“If we wait for these guys to solve the problem, we’ll die waiting,” Graham scolded.

The defense of X (Twitter) and TikTok

On behalf of X, its Executive Director, Linda Yaccarinothey justified that “less than 1% of X users are between 13 and 17 years old”, thus moving away from the discussed problem.

For his part, the CEO of TikTok, Shou chewnoted that it “intends to invest more than $2 billion this year alone” in safety and that it has 40,000 professionals in this field, including child safety specialists.

The CEO of Discord, Jason Citronexplained that they use artificial intelligence to identify criminals in their network and, the CEO of Snap, Evan Spiegelsaid that while the contents of your application are deleted by default, copies remain on file in case “accountability” is needed.

“If all this worked we wouldn’t be here today,” concluded the Democratic senator. Richard Durbin.

Congress has several child protection bills before it, such as “Stop the law against CSAM”which aims to crack down on the proliferation of child pornography online, support victims and increase accountability of platforms.