Armed with fake teen girl profile, US senator blasts Facebook over safety

After following sites on extreme dieting and eating disorders, the feed became a target of sites that promote both self-destructive behaviours. — Photo by John Schnobrich on Unsplash

US Sen. Richard Blumenthal's staff created a fake 13-year-old girl, then watched Facebook sites on eating disorders and extreme dieting follow her around the Internet, Connecticut's senior senator announced during a Thursday hearing in Washington.

That undercover sting became the backdrop for Blumenthal's charges that Facebook has staged a "relentless campaign to recruit and exploit younger users," using deceptive tactics and ignoring online safety issues that even the platform's own researchers have acknowledged.

Blumenthal, D-CT, as chairman of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, and Data Security, said during the hearing that his office had the idea to portray young teenager to explore what might happen. After following sites on extreme dieting and eating disorders, the feed became a target of sites that promote both self-destructive behaviours.

"That is the perfect storm that Instagram has fostered and created," Blumenthal said.

Citing his staff findings and recent reporting in the Wall Street Journal, Blumenthal noted that earlier this year, a Senate colleague was told by Facebook that it was "not aware" of damages that can result from too much screen time for kids.

"That response was simply untrue," Blumenthal said. "Facebook knows – it knows – the evidence of harm to teens is substantial and specific to Instagram."

"We now know while Facebook publicly denies that Instagram is deeply harmful for teens, privately Facebook researchers and experts have been ringing the alarm for years." Blumenthal said in an early afternoon statement. "We now know that Facebook routinely puts profits ahead of kids' online safety, we know it chooses the growth of its products over the well-being of our children, and we now know it is indefensibly delinquent in acting to protect them."

Blumenthal, as Connecticut attorney general, was a key player in the 1998 national settlement with cigarette manufacturers totalling US$206bil (RM860bil). On Thursday, he likened Facebook's tactics to those of "Big Tobacco" when it kept its research on addiction and the toxicity of its products, secret from the public.

"It has weaponised childhood vulnerabilities against children themselves," he said.

A request for comment from Facebook was not immediately returned on Thursday. It recently announced that it was delaying plans for a new Instagram app for children ages 10 to 12. – Connecticut Post, Bridgeport