Speaker 1: Hey guys, it's Andrea Gunning with some big Betrayal news.
Speaker 1: I have been on location with some of the people
Speaker 1: you heard in season two, Ashley Avea and their family
Speaker 1: to shoot a docuseries for Hulu. I'll let you know
Speaker 1: when the docuseries available on Hulu later this year. We're
Speaker 1: all so excited to announce that Betrayal will become a
Speaker 1: weekly series starting this summer. Thanks to your support of
Speaker 1: this podcast, we'll be able to bring you many real
Speaker 1: life stories of betrayal, making this community even stronger. So
Speaker 1: if you've been thinking about sharing your story, now is
Speaker 1: the time. Email has a Betrayal Pod at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1: That's Betrayal Pod at gmail dot com. I want to
Speaker 1: share some news that affects and children everywhere. Our second
Speaker 1: season of Betrayal focus on families destroyed by child sexual
Speaker 1: abuse material also called see SAM. The National Center for
Speaker 1: Missing and Exploited Children has reviewed over three hundred and
Speaker 1: twenty two million images and videos of child sexual exploitation.
Speaker 1: It's hard to wrap your head around that. It's why
Speaker 1: we couldn't stay away from the topic last season. It's
Speaker 1: also been a big issue in Washington recently. Betrayal producer
Speaker 1: Kerrie Hartman has been following developments. Carrie, I know you
Speaker 1: watched it. What did you see?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I watched it. It was fascinating. The Senate Judiciary Committee,
Speaker 2: they subpoened five CEOs of some of the biggest tech
Speaker 2: companies Discord, Snap, Meta X, you know formerly Twitter, and TikTok,
Speaker 2: and the committee wants to advance several bills that address
Speaker 2: online safety for children. And this hearing it got a
Speaker 2: ton of publicity, and at the beginning Senate Judiciary Chair
Speaker 2: explained how the committee was feeling.
Speaker 3: These apps have changed the ways we live, work, and play,
Speaker 3: but as investigations have detailed, social media and messaging apps
Speaker 3: have also given predators powerful new tools to sexually exploit children.
Speaker 3: Your carefully crafted algorithms can be powerful force in the
Speaker 3: lives of our children. Today we'll hear from the CEOs
Speaker 3: of those companies. Their constant pursuit of engagement and profit
Speaker 3: over basic safety have all put our kids and grandkids
Speaker 3: at risk. But the tech industry alone is not to
Speaker 3: blame for the situation we're in. Those of us in
Speaker 3: Congress need to look in the mirror.
Speaker 2: This was a major issue for two New York Times
Speaker 2: supporters that you talk with earlier this season.
Speaker 1: Yeah, why don't we actually revisit that interview with Gabriel
Speaker 1: Dance and Michael Keller.
Speaker 4: We spoke with people who said that as early as
Speaker 4: two thousand, tech companies knew this was a very serious
Speaker 4: problem and we're doing nothing to solve it. In two
Speaker 4: thousand and nine, when they introduce scanning technology, we knew
Speaker 4: that it could be effective in helping stem the problem.
Speaker 4: Still tech companies were not using it.
Speaker 5: I would say if you talk with most technology policy people,
Speaker 5: their answer would be technology companies don't have that much
Speaker 5: pressure to get rid of harmful content on their platform
Speaker 5: because Section two thirty of the Communications Decency Act shields
Speaker 5: technology companies from any liability for content that users post.
Speaker 1: Can you explain more about what section two thirty does?
Speaker 2: Okay? So, Section two thirty means any lawsuit holding a
Speaker 2: tech company liable for damages won't go anywhere they have immunity.
Speaker 2: So if Facebook court Snapchat or ex as storing or
Speaker 2: transmitting images of c SAM, for example, parents can't hold
Speaker 2: the company responsible. And try to imagine if it was
Speaker 2: your child's photo and if that child was tricked into
Speaker 2: sending it but Section two thirty was passed almost thirty
Speaker 2: years ago, back in nineteen ninety six. No one could
Speaker 2: have imagined back then TikTok or Instagram or even sex stortion.
Speaker 2: People still had their photos developed at the drug store.
Speaker 2: And I have to tell you how real this is.
Speaker 2: I mean, this happened to a close friend of mine,
Speaker 2: to her child. You take a vulnerable kid and a
Speaker 2: savvy adult with no conscience and no barriers.
Speaker 1: Right, So why was there a hearing now?
Speaker 2: It seems in recent months that frustration with tech's immunity
Speaker 2: is just getting bigger on both sides of the aisle.
Speaker 2: And look, this isn't the first time Congress has summoned
Speaker 2: tech leaders for a shaming session. But I was really
Speaker 2: curious was this more than a shaming session? So I
Speaker 2: reached out to Politico technology reporter Rebecca Curred. She was
Speaker 2: in the room for this whole thing, and she shared
Speaker 2: some of her thoughts.
Speaker 6: Oh interesting, I've been covering efforts in Congress to regulate
Speaker 6: social media companies and how they handle kids online safety issues.
Speaker 6: Typically there's a lot of posturing from the senators, but
Speaker 6: in the room, it was very palpable. The emotion because
Speaker 6: this time, the committee members invited families whose children have
Speaker 6: died as a result, they say, of content they've been
Speaker 6: exposed to on the platforms. A number of children have
Speaker 6: committed suicide over cyberbullying, over a new phenomenon that I
Speaker 6: know you guys have covered in the podcast called sextortion,
Speaker 6: where organized criminal groups create fake accounts that opposed to
Speaker 6: be other children and extort elicit images from children and
Speaker 6: then hold them financially.
Speaker 2: My gosh. Yeah, And the committee chair Dick Durbin co
Speaker 2: sponsored the stop Ceesam bill. That bill would hold platforms
Speaker 2: responsible if they host cesam or make it available. And
Speaker 2: you're probably thinking, well, who would make those images available?
Speaker 2: But haven't you ever searched for something like you just
Speaker 2: took up skiing recently, right, so you want to see
Speaker 2: more image of a skiing and then the platform's algorithm
Speaker 2: recommends more content because they think that you like that. Well,
Speaker 2: it does the same thing with nefarious and dangerous content.
Speaker 2: And Senator Ted Cruz went after Meta on exactly that point.
Speaker 7: Missus Szuckerberg and June of twenty twenty three, The Wall
Speaker 7: Street Journal reported that Instagram's recommendation systems were actively connecting
Speaker 7: pedophiles two accounts that were advertising the sale of child
Speaker 7: sexual use material. In other words, this material wasn't just
Speaker 7: living on the dark corners of Instagram. Instagram was helping
Speaker 7: pedophiles find it by promoting graphic hashtags including hashtag pedhore
Speaker 7: and hashtag preteen sex to potential buyers. Instagram also displayed
Speaker 7: the following warning screen to individuals who were searching for
Speaker 7: child abuse material. These results may contain images of child
Speaker 7: sexual abuse. And then you gave users two choices, get
Speaker 7: resources or C results anyway in what sane universe? Is
Speaker 7: there a link for C results anyway?
Speaker 1: How did Mark Zuckerberg respond to that.
Speaker 2: There's no good answer for that, But here's what he said.
Speaker 8: Well, because we might be wrong, we try to trigger
Speaker 8: this this warning, or we tried to when we think
Speaker 8: that there's any chance that there is.
Speaker 2: OK. Here's more from Rebecca Kerrn.
Speaker 6: Tech companies will admit and it is for sure not
Speaker 6: something they want on their platforms. They don't want to
Speaker 6: be hosting CCM, and they take great efforts to remove it,
Speaker 6: and I will give them credit. They invest millions of
Speaker 6: dollars into AI and machine learning to detect it early.
Speaker 6: But it's still there and it gets spread across multiple platforms.
Speaker 1: These companies are self pleasing and self reporting, but we're
Speaker 1: depending on them to find it and shut it down.
Speaker 2: It's interesting that you bring that up because a senator
Speaker 2: from Rhode Island, Senator Sheldon white House commented exactly on
Speaker 2: that issue.
Speaker 9: We are here in this hearing because as a collective,
Speaker 9: your platforms really suck at policing themselves. In my view,
Speaker 9: Section two thirty is a very significant part of that problem.
Speaker 2: Listen, there were great soundbites from senators, but that doesn't
Speaker 2: translate to policy right. Rebecca Kern pointed out that Section
Speaker 2: two thirty served an important purpose, at least for a while.
Speaker 6: We wouldn't be leading the globe in these innovations without
Speaker 6: Section two thirty allowing them to flourish without lawsuits. But
Speaker 6: a lot of other senators are saying, Okay, we allowed
Speaker 6: them to flourish and grow. Now we need to raten
Speaker 6: them in and we're an outlier in the whole globe.
Speaker 6: Europe has been able to pass regulations and hold them accountable,
Speaker 6: and so a lot of people say it's time to
Speaker 6: take away this quote unquote sweetheart deal that we have
Speaker 6: given to tech companies.
Speaker 1: Did any comments stand out to you while you were watching?
Speaker 2: There were a lot of them, but this one from
Speaker 2: Amy Klobrichar kind of got me.
Speaker 10: When a Boeing plane lost a door in mid flight
Speaker 10: several weeks ago, nobody questioned the decision to ground a
Speaker 10: fleet of over seven hundred planes. So why aren't we
Speaker 10: taking this same type of decisive action on the danger
Speaker 10: of these platforms when we know these kids are dying?
Speaker 1: She has a point, right, when everyone is worried about
Speaker 1: their own physical safety.
Speaker 2: Boom, it's done exactly. And I got to tell you
Speaker 2: about another moment that really took the room down, and
Speaker 2: that was when Meta CEO Zuckerberg testified that social media
Speaker 2: doesn't really do any harm to kids.
Speaker 8: With so much of our lives spent on mobile devices
Speaker 8: and social media, it's important to look into the effects
Speaker 8: on team mental health and well being. I take this
Speaker 8: very seriously. Mental health is a complex issue, and the
Speaker 8: existing body of scientific work has not shown a cause
Speaker 8: a link between using social media and young people having
Speaker 8: worse mental health outcomes.
Speaker 1: Did he say that with a straight face?
Speaker 2: He did, and there was some laughter. I mean, it
Speaker 2: was one very short moment of levity. But you know,
Speaker 2: it's just so absurd. You don't have to be a
Speaker 2: social scienceist or a psychologist to understand that social media
Speaker 2: impacts kids a lot.
Speaker 1: Was there anyone there defending the work of technology companies?
Speaker 1: I mean, there are ways they've enriched all of our lives.
Speaker 1: Can you even remember life before Amazon?
Speaker 2: Life before Amazon? We mean going to a store and
Speaker 2: having to wait in line? No, of course, not no,
Speaker 2: but all kidding aside. Some senators mentioned that and did
Speaker 2: praise these companies for adding some value to society. But
Speaker 2: this hearing wasn't set up for pushback. It was really
Speaker 2: about these tech companies being told draconian measures are coming
Speaker 2: if you don't do a better job. But outside of this,
Speaker 2: there is an advocate for the tech company called net Choice,
Speaker 2: and they are pushing back pretty hard. They have filed
Speaker 2: several lawsuits against states that are tired of waiting for
Speaker 2: the federal government to do something.
Speaker 1: Can you give me an example.
Speaker 2: Sure, there's one. Net Choice is suing the Ohio Attorney
Speaker 2: General over the Social Media Parental Notification Act. This law
Speaker 2: requires companies to obtain parental consent before individual's younger than
Speaker 2: sixteen can use platforms like Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat. So
Speaker 2: ne choice does not support any of these bills being
Speaker 2: pushed by the Judiciary Committee. What do they support, well,
Speaker 2: free speech is what they hang their hat on. Free speech,
Speaker 2: Free speech all the way. But one thing that they
Speaker 2: did promote that we'll be familiar to our season two
Speaker 2: listeners is to hold child abusers accountable by prosecuting more
Speaker 2: of them. You know, far too many reports of c
Speaker 2: SAM offenses are not investigated, not prosecuted. Because we talked
Speaker 2: about this, Andrea like their triage right, there's not enough
Speaker 2: law enforcement to go after all the people that are
Speaker 2: breaking these laws, and when they're able to go after them,
Speaker 2: they can prosecute them and at least put them in
Speaker 2: for some kind of prison time. But despite that choice,
Speaker 2: there was some movement on one of the bills called KOSA,
Speaker 2: or the Kids Online Safety Act. Now, this bill wouldn't
Speaker 2: repeal Section two thirty, so we asked Rebecca Kerrn, what would.
Speaker 6: It do that one specifically, would hold tech companies accountable
Speaker 6: and imposing a duty of care for them to make
Speaker 6: sure that their recommendation systems, their algorithms do not recommend
Speaker 6: harmful quote content. That is the key word, how do
Speaker 6: you define harmful for them, They're saying it's suicide content,
Speaker 6: it's eating disordered content.
Speaker 2: And Rebecca pointed out that some groups are worried about
Speaker 2: KOSA moving forward.
Speaker 6: Progressive LGBTQ groups are saying, we're worried that this bill
Speaker 6: also empowers state at Traded General to sue over harmful content.
Speaker 6: And how they would define content maybe like trans content
Speaker 6: or LGBTQ content that these communities would want to see
Speaker 6: on the platforms. Some conservative liing ags may want to
Speaker 6: take that down. So they said this could have an
Speaker 6: inadvertently negative impact for certain vulnerable youth.
Speaker 2: While the CEOs were on the hot seat, and you know,
Speaker 2: the day before they were called to the hearing, they
Speaker 2: did make some concessions that are worth mentioning. Here is
Speaker 2: X CEO Lida yak Areina X.
Speaker 11: Supports the Stop c SAM Act. The Kids Online Safe
Speaker 11: DAC should continue to progress and we will support the
Speaker 11: continuation to engage with it and ensure the protections of
Speaker 11: the freedom of speech.
Speaker 2: And you know, SNAP CEOs Evan Spiegel also came out
Speaker 2: in support of KOSA and look, it's not everything, but
Speaker 2: maybe it's a start. Here's Politico's Rebecca Kurrent.
Speaker 6: Again, these are the constant battles these platforms have to
Speaker 6: deal with between privacy, which is such a strong protection
Speaker 6: in our country, and free speech and other protection and
Speaker 6: safety and there's you know, no real mandate to put
Speaker 6: safety first.
Speaker 1: Do you think Section two thirty has a chance of
Speaker 1: being repealed?
Speaker 2: I asked re Becca that question, and she seemed pretty doubtful.
Speaker 2: You know, it's not just the law passing, but it's
Speaker 2: it's the lawsuits that would follow, and how many years
Speaker 2: would it be caught up in court.
Speaker 1: I can't help, but wonder did this hearing make a difference.
Speaker 2: If you're asking will it create more safety for children online?
Speaker 2: I think there is a reason for hope. There was
Speaker 2: some movement we've never seen before. But people need to
Speaker 2: keep applying pressure because that does make a difference.
Speaker 1: Thank you to Politico's Rebecca Kern for her insight, and
Speaker 1: thanks to our listeners for your support of Betrayal. Remember
Speaker 1: if you want to share your story for the new
Speaker 1: weekly series of Betrayal coming this summer, email us at
Speaker 1: Betrayal Pod at gmail dot com. That's Betrayal Pod at
Speaker 1: gmail dot com. Betrayal is a production of Glass Podcasts,
Speaker 1: a division of Glass Entertainment Group and partnership with iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 1: The show was executive produced by Nancy Glass and Jennifer Fason,
Speaker 1: posted and produced by me Andrea Gunning, Written and produced
Speaker 1: by Kerry Hartman, also produced by Ben Fetterman, Associate producer
Speaker 1: Kristin Melcurie. Our iHeart team is Ali Perry and Jessica Krincheck.
Speaker 1: Audio editing and mixing by Matt Alvecchio. Betrayal's theme composed
Speaker 1: by Oliver Bains. Music library provide by my Music and
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