Zuckerberg and Senator Hawley clash in fiery child safety hearing

Mr Zuckerberg let me start with you did I hear you say in your opening statement that there's no link between mental health and social media use Senator what I said is I think it's important to look at the science I know it's people widely talk about this as if that is something that's already been proven and I think that the bulk of the scientific evidence does not support that well really let let me just remind you of some of the science from your own company Instagram studied the effect of your platform on teenagers let me

just read you some quotes from The Wall Street journal's report on this company researchers found that Instagram is harmful for a sizable percentage of teenagers most notably teenage girls here's a quote from your own study quote we make body image issues worse for one in Three teen girls here's another quote teens blamed Instagram this is your study for increases in the rate of anxiety and depression this reaction was unprompted and consistent across all groups that's your study Senator we try to understand the uh the feedback and and how people feel about the services we can

improve a minute your own your own studies says that you make life worse for one and three teenage girls you increase anxiety and depression that's what it says and you're here testifying to us in public that there's no link you've been doing this for years for years you've been coming in public and testifying under oath that there's absolutely no link your product is wonderful the science is nent Full Speed Ahead while internally you know know full well your product is a disaster for teenagers and yet you keep right on doing what you're doing right that's

not true that's not true let me let me let me show you some other facts I know that you're familiar with wait a minute wait a minute wait a minute that's not a question that's not a question those are facts Mr Zuckerberg that's not a question those aren't facts let me show you some more facts here are some here's some information from a whistleblower who came before the Senate testified under oath in public he worked for you it's a senior executive here's what he showed he found when he studied your products so for example this

is girls between the ages of 13 and 15 years old 37% of them reported that they had been exposed to nudity on the platform unwanted in the last seven days 24% said that they had experienced unwanted sexual advances they've been propositioned in the last 7 Days 177% said they had encountered self harm content pushed at them in the last seven days now I know you're familiar with these stats because he sent you an email where he lined it all out I mean we've got a copy of it right here my question is who did you

fire for this who got fired because of that Senator we study all this because it's important and we want to improve our services well you just told me a second ago you studied it but that there was no linkage who did you fire I said you mischaracterized 37% of teenage girls between 13 and 15 were exposed to unwanted nudity in a week on Instagram you knew about it who did you fire Senator this is why we're building all didols Senator that's I don't think that that's who did you fire I'm not going to answer that

um that's you didn't fire anybody right you didn't take any significant it's appropriate to talk about like IND decisions do you know who's sitting behind you you've got families from across the nation whose children are either severely harmed or gone and you don't think it's appropriate to take a talk about steps that you took the fact that you didn't fire a single person let me ask you this let me ask you this have you compensated any of the victims sorry have you compensated any of the victims these girls have you compensated them I don't believe

so you why not don't you think they deserve some compensation for what your platform has done help with counseling services help with dealing with the issues that your your services caused our our job is to make sure that we build tools to help keep people safe are you going to compensate them Senator our job and what we take seriously is making sure that we build industry-leading tools to find harmful cont take it off the services to make money and to build tools that Empower parents so you any action you didn't take any action you didn't

fire anybody you haven't compensated a single victim let me ask you this let me ask you this there's families of victims here today have you apologize to the victims I would you like to do so now well they're here you're on National Television would you like now to apologize to the victims who have been harmed by your product show them the pictures would you like to apologize for what you've done to these good [Applause] people things that your families suffered and this is why we invested so much and are going continue doing industry leag efforts

to uh to make sure that go through the types of things that your families have had to suffer you know why Mr Zuckerberg why should your company not be sued for this why is it that you can claim you hide behind a liability Shield you can't be held accountable shouldn't you be held accountable personally will you take personal responsibility Senator I I think I've already answered this I mean this is these try will you take personal responsibility Senator I VI my job and the job of our company is building the best tools that we can

to keep our community safe well you're failing at that well Senator we're doing an industry-leading effort we build AI tools nonsense your product is killing people will you personally commit to compensating the victims you're a billionaire will you commit to compensating the victims we set up a compensation fund with your money I think these are these are your Mone Senator these are complicated no that's not a complicated question though that's yes or no will you set up a victim's compensation fund with your money the money you made on on these families sitting behind you yes

or no Senator I don't think that that's my job is to good tools my my J make sure your job is to be responsible for what your company has done you've made billions of dollars on the people sitting behind them are you here you've done nothing to help them you've done nothing to compensate them you've done nothing to put it right you could do so here today and you should you should Mr Zuckerberg