Written by Marsha Blackburn
U.S. Senator
Washington, D.C. – Mason Bogard was like any other teenager. He loved hiking, practicing his drums, and making jokes with his friends. He focused on getting good grades at his high school in southern Indiana and spent his free time crafting fishing lures and honing his woodworking skills. He dreamed of one day joining the U.S. Army, and he had a family that loved him and would do anything to help him succeed. But nothing could protect him from the harms of Big Tech.
May 1st, 2019, was a school night, and Mason had just hugged his parents goodnight. Moments later, after hearing an unusual noise from his room, they rushed in to discover his lifeless body. Next to him lay his phone, which recorded his final moments: attempting a viral “choking game” challenge, in which children make themselves pass out by wrapping a belt around their neck. Mason hadn’t searched for the video. YouTube’s algorithm pushed it into his feed.
At last week’s hearing for the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and the Law, which I chair, Mason’s mother, Joann, shared her heartbreaking story. She is one of a growing number of survivor parents who have lost their children to social media harms—and who are demanding accountability from the Big Tech giants that put profit over children’s safety.
The hearing followed landmark verdicts out of California and New Mexico that found that social media companies intentionally design their platforms to addict children and profit off them—no matter the consequences. One of the witnesses during the hearing, attorney Rachel Lanier, helped lead the successful California case against Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram. Her team revealed evidence that Meta executives have repeatedly lied—including before Congress—about children’s online safety.
In 2024 congressional testimony, CEO Mark Zuckerberg claimed that his company doesn’t allow children under 13 on its platforms. Yet internal Meta documents estimated that four million children under 13 were on Instagram alone in 2015—roughly 30 percent of all 10-to-12 year olds in America. In internal communications, the company admitted this was its goal all along. As one employee put it, “if we want to win big with teens, we must bring them in as tweens.”
Zuckerberg also testified that there was no evidence linking growing social media use and worsening mental health among minors. Yet Meta’s own documents catalogued “known negative effects” of social media, including sleep disruption, anxiety, body image pressure, and depression.
Despite knowing these harms, Meta and other Big Tech giants worked to make their platforms as addictive as possible for children. One Instagram employee wrote that the platform “is a drug… We’re basically pushers.” Google’s in-house design ethicist warned his colleagues that YouTube’s design features mirrored the addictive qualities of slot machines, calling the company’s products “attention casinos.”
While fostering addiction, these platforms have exposed children to sexual abuse, drug dealers, and pro-suicide content. Although they claim to combat these abuses, evidence shows otherwise. Joann told our committee that, to this day, “choking challenge” videos continue to flood social media platforms despite violating their terms of service and her repeated attempts to report them. According to one recent study, less than 5% of dangerous challenges on YouTube, Vimeo, TikTok, and Instagram are removed after being reported.
Big Tech will not protect our children. While the recent verdicts out of California and New Mexico prove that courts can punish past harms, it is up to Congress to prevent future ones. That’s why Congress must give minors the same protections in the virtual space that we require for every other industry.
Last week, I joined survivor parents for a rally outside the U.S. Capitol. Their message was clear: Congress must pass the Kids Online Safety Act. The bipartisan legislation, which I lead alongside Senator Blumenthal (D-Conn.), would establish a duty of care to ensure that social media platforms are safe for children by default. Among other provisions, the bill would require options to disable addictive product features like algorithmic recommendations, give parents dedicated channels to report harmful behavior, and require independent audits to ensure platforms are taking meaningful steps to address risks to kids.
At the rally, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Cruz (R-Texas) vowed to move this legislation forward and help get it signed into law by the end of the year, and I urge him to do so without delay. By sending the Kids Online Safety Act to President Trump’s desk, we can deliver a clear message to Big Tech: Our children are worth protecting. And we aren’t going to let them sacrifice our kids’ well-being to protect their bottom line.
