ICYMI: CNN: Meta deal ‘doesn't address the subject of the addiction'

WASHINGTON, DC – Today, The Tech Oversight Project spotlighted an interview from survivor parent, Lori Schott, and Meta whistleblower, Arturo Béjar on CNN about the limitations of the multi-state settlement with Meta and why congressional action is still needed. Lori Schott’s daughter, Annalee, was 18 years old when she died by suicide after becoming addicted to social media, which exacerbated her depression and presented content that encouraged suicide.

Arturo Béjar worked at Meta from 2009 to 2015 and returned to the company in 2019 as a consultant on Instagram’s well-being team. During his time at Meta, Béjar conducted research on unwanted sexual advances minors were receiving from adults on the platform and developed reports on harmful experiences young people were experiencing on the platform. Béjar, whose own daughter experienced unwanted contact from adults, came forward as Meta whistleblower after his research and product recommendations were ignored by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram Chief Adam Mosseri. He has testified before Congress about the dangers of social media addiction and Meta’s unwillingness to protect young people, and he served as an expert witness in numerous federal and state social media addiction trials.

Excerpts from the CNN interview are below:

Lori Schott: She left us a note on the day she died that said, I love my family. Don't be sad for me. It's not you. It's me. It enabled me to go downstairs and start to try to piece together what happened to a little girl that just had a blessed life and a loved family, and what we found were the internal thoughts and her processes for trying to deal with social media that engaged her within your beauty filters and other appearance altering unhealthy comparisons. And it just destroyed her. It destroyed her self-esteem.

And at the same time, these engagement-driven recommendations and constant notification was just pulling her back into this deep and dark content – even as far as telling her not to believe her parents and that taking her life was the only way to stop the pain.

Arturo Béjar: That is the issue at the heart of what's difficult about the consent decree, which is that it doesn't address the substance of the addiction. It doesn't address the kind of content that Annalee got recommended, which in 2021, the company knew was affecting one in eight, 13 to 15 year olds, every seven days, multiple times. 

So until you address the sort of definition of harm that Meta denies, these recommendations that can create a stream of content that to vulnerable teen, and in a moment of vulnerability, could help teach somebody or encourage somebody to take their own lives, we will continue to see this. These products continue to be harmful, but just less hours a day.

Arturo Béjar: You can take away beautiful filters and that helps, but, negative comparison continues to be an issue. You can take away likes, but [Meta] keep views enabled. You can see the number of views a real has, and today, that's the primary driver of harm is what makes teenagers copy behavior.In order for these changes to be effective, you have to look at them as a package…We're telling teams that it's okay to smoke cigarettes for two hours a day rather than as much as they could, and that's just not enough.

Lori Schott: We have a lot of work to do in holding all these social media companies accountable and also heading to D.C. and our state capitals to get universal safety protocols in place…Meta isn't doing this out of the goodness of their heart. They're doing it because they were dragged into a court of law and forced into this situation.

Arturo Béjar: What I found is that soon after she opened her account, she started experiencing unwanted sexual advances, receiving requests for sex, receiving misogyny, harassment, bullying – the kinds of things that kids have died from…She tried to use all of Instagram's tools, and she didn't get any help. 

Now, the question has to do with, what is the parents's responsibility around this?

And I think that absolutely parents have a role to play, but every survivor parent that has spoken to was careful and engaged and thoughtful. The product that we gave our children has to be safe enough…Imagine a car where a parent has to sit in the car next to the kid all of the time in order for that to be safe. The car has to be safe enough for the kids to get into.

Lori Schott: My whole focus is getting these platforms to a safer place. [Mark Zuckerberg]’s words are a void to me and all the other parents. He had every opportunity…and I saw the emails, where they knew that they were harming children before my daughter died. They had every opportunity to make changes within the design of these platforms, and they did nothing.

I contribute her death to him and the platform decisions that he made.