Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg was urged by Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) to personally apologize to families of children harmed through social media during a Wednesday hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Hawley directly asked Zuckerberg if he has apologized to victims.
Parent advocates in the hearing room, many who are holding signs of their children who they say were impacted by harms from social media companies, said “no.”
Zuckerberg defended the company by saying Meta, which is the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, has “industry leading” efforts to mitigate risks.
Hawley called the defense “nonsense” and told Zuckerberg “your products are killing people.”
The senator also asked Zuckerberg if he would set up a victims compensation fund with his own money that Hawley said was earned in part through the victims sitting behind the CEO.
Zuckerberg said his job is to make sure Meta has tools to mitigate risks.
Along with Zuckerberg, the CEOs of TikTok, Discord, Snapchat and X, formerly known as Twitter, are testifying.
During the hearing, senators have pressed the CEOs over harms related to the prevalence of online child sexual abuse material as well as other harmful content, such as posts promoting self harm, suicide and eating disorders.
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