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"Online platforms use sophisticated and opaque techniques of data collection that endanger young people and put their healthy development at risk," said one children's advocate.
Child welfare advocates renewed calls for U.S. lawmakers to pass a pair of controversial bills aimed at protecting youth from Big Tech's "dangerous and unacceptable business practices" after the Federal Trade Commission published a report Thursday detailing how social media and streaming companies endanger children and teens who use their platforms.
The FTC staff report—entitled A Look Behind the Screens: Examining the Data Practices of Social Media and Video Streaming Services—"shows how the tech industry's monetization of personal data has created a market for commercial surveillance, especially via social media and video streaming services, with inadequate guardrails to protect consumers."
The agency staff examined the practices of Meta platforms, which include Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp; YouTube; X, formerly known as Twitter; Snapchat; Reddit; Discord; Amazon, which owns the gaming site Twitch; and ByteDance, the owner of TikTok.
"The report finds that these companies engaged in mass data collection of their users and—in some cases—nonusers," Bureau of Consumer Protection Director Samuel Levine said in the paper. "It reveals that many companies failed to implement adequate safeguards against privacy risks. It sheds light on how companies used our personal data, from serving hypergranular targeted advertisements to powering algorithms that shape the content we see, often with the goal of keeping us hooked on using the service."
The publication "also finds that these practices pose unique risks to children and teens, with the companies having done little to respond effectively to the documented concerns that policymakers, psychologists, and parents have expressed over young people's physical and mental well-being."
FTC Chair Lina Khan said in a statement that "the report lays out how social media and video streaming companies harvest an enormous amount of Americans' personal data and monetize it to the tune of billions of dollars a year."
"While lucrative for the companies, these surveillance practices can endanger people's privacy, threaten their freedoms, and expose them to a host of harms, from identify theft to stalking," she added.
Researchers at Boston Children's Hospital and Harvard University published an analysis last December that revealed social media companies made nearly $11 billion in 2022 advertising revenue from U.S.-based users younger than 18.
According to the FTC report:
While the use of social media and digital technology can provide many positive opportunities for self-directed learning, forming community, and reducing isolation, it also has been associated with harms to physical and mental health, including through exposure to bullying, online harassment, child sexual exploitation, and exposure to content that may exacerbate mental health issues, such as the promotion of eating disorders, among other things.
The publication also flags "algorithms that may prioritize certain forms of harmful content, such as dangerous online challenges."
The report accuses social media companies of "willful blindness around child users" by claiming that there are no children on their platforms because their sites do not allow them to create accounts. This may constitute an attempt by the companies to avoid legal liability under the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act Rule (COPPA). Last December, Khan
proposed sweeping changes to COPPA to address the issue.
Josh Golin, executive director of Fairplay—a nonprofit organization "committed to helping children thrive in an increasingly commercialized, screen-obsessed culture"—said in a statement that "this report from the FTC is yet more proof that Big Tech's business model is harmful to children and teens."
"Online platforms use sophisticated and opaque techniques of data collection that endanger young people and put their healthy development at risk," Golin added. "We thank the FTC for listening to the concerns raised by Fairplay and a coalition of advocacy groups, and we call on Congress to pass COPPA 2.0, the Children and Teens' Online Privacy Protection Act, and KOSA, the Kids Online Safety Act, to better safeguard our children from these companies' dangerous and unacceptable business practices."
On Wednesday, the House Energy and Commerce Committee voted to advance COPPA 2.0 and KOSA, both of which were overwhelmingly passed by the Senate in July.
However, rights groups including the ACLU condemned KOSA, which the civil liberties organization warned "would violate the First Amendment by enabling the federal government to dictate what information people can access online and encourage social media platforms to censor protected speech."
In May 2023, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy issued an advisory on "the growing concerns about the effects of social media on youth mental health."
The White House simultaneously announced the creation of a federal task force "to advance the health, safety, and privacy of minors online with particular attention to preventing and mitigating the adverse health effects of online platforms."
Murthy has also called for tobacco-like warning labels on social media to address the platform's possible harms to children and teens.
According to a study published in January by the corporate power watchdog Ekō, in just one week that month there were more than 33 million posts on TikTok and Meta-owned Instagram "under hashtags housing problematic content directed at young users," including suicide, eating disorders, skin-whitening, and so-called "involuntary celibacy."
"Without new protections," they warned, "today's supercharged, AI-powered algorithms risk reinforcing and magnifying the discrimination that marginalized communities already experience."
U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Sen. Ed Markey on Monday sent a letter urging the Biden administration to pursue additional action to protect civil rights and liberties related to federal agencies' use of artificial intelligence.
While recognizing the "strong steps" that the administration has already taken—such as President Joe Biden's October 2023 executive order—Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Markey (D-Mass.) stressed to Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Shalanda Young that "more must be done" to mitigate, prevent, and eliminate algorithmic bias and discrimination.
Specifically, the pair is pushing OMB to "require all federal agencies that use AI for consequential decisions to establish a civil rights office, if they do not already have one; ensure all civil rights offices are staffed with experts in algorithmic discrimination; and encourage federal agencies to establish additional safeguards to prevent algorithmic discrimination."
As the Biden White House explained in its 2022 Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights, "Algorithmic discrimination occurs when automated systems contribute to unjustified different treatment or impacts disfavoring people based on their race, color, ethnicity, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, and related medical conditions, gender identity, intersex status, and sexual orientation), religion, age, national origin, disability, veteran status, genetic information, or any other classification protected by law."
"Biased algorithms have increasingly been used to make or influence decisions, imposing real harm on Black, Brown, immigrant, and other marginalized communities."
The ACLU earlier this year sued Biden's National Security Agency in hopes of uncovering how it is using AI, and emphasized concerns that the NSA's use of such tools could harm civil rights and liberties.
The senators wrote Monday that "by ensuring that agencies have the resources, personnel, and policies to detect and mitigate bias, we can ensure that the AI age does not come at the expense of already marginalized and vulnerable communities."
"Without new protections," they warned, "today's supercharged, AI-powered algorithms risk reinforcing and magnifying the discrimination that marginalized communities already experience due to poorly trained and tested algorithms."
The senators highlighted how "biased algorithms have increasingly been used to make or influence decisions, imposing real harm on Black, Brown, immigrant, and other marginalized communities," citing examples from mortgage applications, hiring and employment, government benefits, and healthcare.
Earlier this year, OMB issued guidance regarding government use of AI tools, which Damon T. Hewitt, president and executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, called "a significant step to implement meaningful safeguards."
Noting that the guidance directs agencies to "cease use of any AI that the agency finds cannot adequately mitigate unlawful discrimination," the senators argued that "OMB should also work with agencies to set strict guidelines to prevent algorithmic discrimination within relevant agency jurisdiction."
The OMB, they said, should push agencies to require recipients of federal funds and contracts "to complete pre-development, pre-deployment, and ongoing impact assessments to identify, mitigate, prevent, and eliminate biased AI," as well as "to allow individuals to opt out of AI-powered algorithms used in consequential decisions and instead request human decision-makers."
The senators also urged the office to pressure U.S. agencies to "fund the development of common, accessible resources for auditing algorithms—including open-source tools—for bias, discrimination, and other harms," and to "develop guidance on best practices for mitigating the development and deployment of biased AI-powered algorithms."
"Finally, because a regulation is only as strong as its enforcement, OMB should support federal agencies that take robust enforcement against any company found to violate these rules," the senators wrote, calling on Young to convene inspectors general to coordinate on best practices.
Reporting on the letter, Axios noted Monday that "Schumer's bipartisan AI roadmap fell short for civil rights organizations that wanted stronger language on algorithmic bias and discrimination."
Meanwhile, Markey has been a key force behind both the Algorithmic Justice and Online Platform Transparency Act and the Facial Recognition and Biometric Technology Moratorium Act.
A new analysis and call for a constitutional amendment comes as reporting sheds light on Sen. JD Vance's ties to a right-wing group backed by tech and digital currency investors.
A report out Wednesday takes aim at how giants of the cryptocurrency industry are using the 2010 Citizens United ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, which opened the floodgates for dark money in political campaigns, to make a massive deregulatory push ahead of this year's pivotal election.
Based on Public Citizen research director Rick Claypool's analysis of federal election data from OpenSecrets, the consumer advocacy group accused the crypto industry of "exploiting" the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruling "to an unprecedented degree, dwarfing direct corporate spending by Big Oil and other corporate sectors in the 2024 elections."
Claypool found that crypto companies have dumped over $119 million into the 2024 federal elections so far, mostly through super political action committees (PACs) focused on elevating candidates that back their industry and opposing any skeptics.
"Nearly half (48%) of all corporate money contributed during this year's elections ($248 million so far) came from crypto backers," the report notes. Koch Industries, the conglomerate of the infamous Koch brothers, "is a distant second place," having put $25 million toward Americans for Prosperity Action and $3.25 million toward electing Republicans to Congress.
"That cryptocurrency companies like Coinbase and Ripple are able to spend over a hundred million dollars to silence crypto's critics and elevate its backers embodies everything that is wrong with the Supreme Court's disastrous Citizens United decision."
Since Citizens United, there has been at least $884 million in known corporate contributions to elections. Already, crypto corporations' spending for the past three cycles amounts to 15% of that total—and 92% has been during this cycle. The industry now only trails fossil fuel companies in election-related spending in the wake of the 2010 ruling.
"That cryptocurrency companies like Coinbase and Ripple are able to spend over a hundred million dollars to silence crypto's critics and elevate its backers embodies everything that is wrong with the Supreme Court's disastrous Citizens United decision," Claypool said in a statement.
Claypool stressed that "corporations can't vote. But the sole reason crypto is a hot-button topic in this election cycle is that crypto businesses are spending eye-popping sums to make themselves impossible to ignore."
"All this spending is a concern not just because the crypto companies may be able to buy deregulation," he warned. "This direct spending by crypto corporations is shattering a long-standing norm—and is likely to set a precedent for vastly more direct spending by corporations in upcoming elections."
Much of the industry's money from this cycle—nearly $114 million—has gone to the sector's Fairshake PAC and its affiliates. The report details how the group intervened in two Democratic primaries:
When Fairshake and its affiliates spend money to influence races, either by attacking crypto skeptics or boosting crypto supporters, the ads don't mention crypto at all. The super PAC spent $10 million on ads against Rep. Katie Porter in California's Senate primary and $2 million against Rep. Jamaal Bowman in a primary contest in New York. Rather than criticizing candidates for not sufficiently supporting crypto, both attack campaigns smeared the candidates' using unflattering claims having nothing to do with crypto policy.
In Bowman's case, he was also targeted by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and its affiliates for his criticism of U.S. support for Israel's assault of the Gaza Strip. Another target of both pro-Israel and crypto groups was fellow progressive Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.), who lost her primary earlier this month.
Industry use of Fairshake is expected to continue through November. The report points out that "the super PAC recently pledged to spend $25 million backing 18 House candidates—nine Democrats and nine Republicans—in the general election."
The report also lays out how both major parties' presidential nominees—former Republican President Donald Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris—and their allies have been courting the industry this cycle:
The new Public Citizen report—which concludes with a call for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United—was released a day after Reuters reported that before Vance joined the Republican ticket, "he co-founded a Silicon Valley-backed donor organization to finance right-wing news stories, voter turnout operations, and election polls."
"The existence of Rockbridge and Vance's link to it have been previously reported," the outlet detailed. "But three internal Rockbridge documents reviewed by Reuters and half a dozen sources familiar with the group reveal the scale of its ambitions, its roughly $75 million budget for 2024, and its role in seeking to influence November's presidential election."
"Rockbridge showcases how Trump's selection of Vance as his running mate could empower a new set of Republican businessmen: heavyweight tech investors who favor far-reaching deregulation," Reuters continued. "Many want to weaken the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which regulates Wall Street, and reduce oversight of cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence."
Meanwhile, in remarks cheered by Bush, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) declared at the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday night that there is an urgent "need to get big money out of our political process."
"Billionaires in both parties should not be able to buy elections, including primary elections," he said. "For the sake of our democracy, we must overturn the disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision and move toward public funding of elections."
OpenSecrets revealed last week that outside spending during the current election cycle has hit a record $1 billion.