    [House Hearing, 117 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

       HOLDING BIG TECH ACCOUNTABLE: LEGISLATION TO PROTECT ONLINE USERS

    =======================================================================

                                 HYBRID HEARING

                                   BEFORE THE

                SUBCOMMITTEE ON CONSUMER PROTECTION AND COMMERCE

                                     OF THE

                        COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE
                            HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                        ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                                 SECOND SESSION

                                   __________

                                 MARCH 1, 2022

                                   __________

                               Serial No. 117-70

         Published for the use of the Committee on Energy and Commerce

                       govinfo.gov/committee/house-energy
                            energycommerce.house.gov

                             ______

                 U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
     59-693 PDF           WASHINGTON : 2025

                        COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE

                        FRANK PALLONE, Jr.,  New Jersey
                                     Chairman
    BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois              CATHY Mc  MORRIS RODGERS,
    ANNA G. ESHOO, California                Washington
    DIANA De  GETTE, Colorado              Ranking Member
    MIKE DOYLE, Pennsylvania             FRED UPTON, Michigan
    JAN SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois             MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas
    G. K. BUTTERFIELD, North Carolina    STEVE SCALISE, Louisiana
    DORIS O. MATSUI, California          ROBERT E. LATTA, Ohio
    KATHY CASTOR, Florida                BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky
    JOHN P. SARBANES, Maryland           DAVID B. Mc  KINLEY, West Virginia
    JERRY Mc  NERNEY, California         ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois
    PETER WELCH, Vermont                 H. MORGAN GRIFFITH, Virginia
    PAUL TONKO, New York                 GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida
    YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York           BILL JOHNSON, Ohio
    KURT SCHRADER, Oregon                BILLY LONG, Missouri
    TONY CARDENAS, California            LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana
    RAUL RUIZ, California                MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma
    SCOTT H. PETERS, California          RICHARD HUDSON, North Carolina
    DEBBIE DINGELL, Michigan             TIM WALBERG, Michigan
    MARC A. VEASEY, Texas                EARL L. ``BUDDY'' CARTER, Georgia
    ANN M. KUSTER, New Hampshire         JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina
    ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois, Vice       GARY J. PALMER, Alabama
        Chair                            NEAL P. DUNN, Florida
    NANETTE DIAZ BARRAGAN, California    JOHN R. CURTIS, Utah
    A. DONALD Mc  EACHIN, Virginia       DEBBIE LESKO, Arizona
    LISA BLUNT ROCHESTER, Delaware       GREG PENCE, Indiana
    DARREN SOTO, Florida                 DAN CRENSHAW, Texas
    TOM O'HALLERAN, Arizona              JOHN JOYCE, Pennsylvania
    KATHLEEN M. RICE, New York           KELLY ARMSTRONG, North Dakota
    ANGIE CRAIG, Minnesota
    KIM SCHRIER, Washington
    LORI TRAHAN, Massachusetts
    LIZZIE FLETCHER, Texas

                               Professional Staff

                       TIFFANY GUARASCIO, Staff Director
                     WAVERLY GORDON, Deputy Staff Director
                      NATE HODSON, Minority Staff Director
                Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Commerce

                            JAN SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois
                                      Chair
    BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois              GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida
    KATHY CASTOR, Florida                  Ranking Member
    LORI TRAHAN, Massachusetts           FRED UPTON, Michigan
    JERRY Mc  NERNEY, California         ROBERT E. LATTA, Ohio
    YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York           BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky
    TONY CARDENAS, California, Vice      LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana
        Chair                            NEAL P. DUNN, Florida
    DEBBIE DINGELL, Michigan             GREG PENCE, Indiana
    ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois             DEBBIE LESKO, Arizona
    DARREN SOTO, Florida                 KELLY ARMSTRONG, North Dakota
    KATHLEEN M. RICE, New York           CATHY Mc  MORRIS RODGERS,
    ANGIE CRAIG, Minnesota                   Washington (ex officio)
    LIZZIE FLETCHER, Texas
    FRANK PALLONE, Jr.,  New Jersey (ex
        officio)
                                 C O N T E N T S

                                  ----------
                                                                       Page
    Hon. Jan Schakowsky, a Representative in Congress from the State
      of Illinois, opening statement.................................     2
        Prepared statement...........................................     4
    Hon. Gus Bilirakis, a Representative in Congress from the State
      of Florida, opening statement..................................     6
        Prepared statement...........................................     8
    Hon. Frank Pallone, a Representative in Congress from the State
      of New Jersey, opening statement...............................    11
        Prepared statement...........................................    13
    Hon. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a Representative in Congress from
      the State of Washington, opening statement.....................    15
        Prepared statement...........................................    17

                                   Witnesses

    Laurel Lehman, Policy Analyst, Consumer Reports..................    21
        Prepared statement...........................................    23
        Answers to submitted questions \3\...........................
    Katie McInnis, Senior Public Policy Manager U.S., Duckduckgo,
      Inc............................................................    43
        Prepared statement...........................................    45
        Answers to submitted questions \3\...........................
    Mike Duffey, Special Agent Supervisor, Florida Department of Law
      Enforcement....................................................    50
        Prepared statement...........................................    52
        Answers to submitted questions...............................   126
    Mutale Nkonde, Chief Executive Officer, AI for the People U.S....    56
        Prepared statement...........................................    58
        Answers to submitted questions...............................   145

                               Submitted Material

    H.R. 6416 the Banning Surveillance Advertising Act of 2022 \1\
    H.R. 6580 the Algorithmic Accountability Act of 2022 \1\
    H.R. 6755 the Cooperation Among Police, Tech, and Users to Resist
      Exploitation Act \1\
    H.R. 6786 the Increasing Consumers' Education on Law Enforcement
      Resources \1\
    H.R. 6796 the Digital Services Oversight and Safety Act of 2022
      \1\
    Letter of February 14, 2022, from Christopher Oswald, Executive
      Vice President, Government Relations the Association of
      National Advertisers, Driving Growth, to Ms. Eshoo, et al.,
      submitted by Mr. Latta.........................................    99
    Letter of March 1, 2022, from Interactive Advertising Bureau,
      submitted by Ms. Lesko \2\

    ----------
    \1\ Legislation has been retained in committee files and also is
      available at https://docs.house.gov/Committee/Calendar/
      ByEvent.aspx?EventID=114439.
    \2\ The information has been retained in committee files and also
      is available at https://docs.house.gov/meetings/IF/IF17/
      20220301/114439/HHRG-117-IF17-20220301-SD004.pdf.
    \3\ Ms. Lehman and Ms. McInnis, did not answer submitted
      questions for the record by the time of publications.
    Report ``Enhancing the FTC's Consumer Protection Authority to
      Regulate Social Media Companies'' by Paul M. Barrett and Lily
      Warnke, NYU/STERN, submitted by Ms. Trahan.....................   102
    Letter of February 28, 2022, from Paul Lekas, Senior Vice
      President, Global Public Policy, Software and Information
      Industry Association, to Ms. Schakowsky and Mr. Bilirakis,
      submitted by Ms. Schakowsky....................................   115
    Letter of February 28, 2022, from Ms. Rodgers, et al., to Ms.
      Khan, submitted by Mr. Bilirakis...............................   121
    Letter of March 1, 2022, Neil L. Bradley, Executive Vice
      President, Chief Policy Officer, Head of Strategic Advocacy,
      U.S. Chamber of Commerce, to Ms. Schakowsky and Mr. Bilirakis,
      submitted by Mr. Guthrie.......................................   124

       HOLDING BIG TECH ACCOUNTABLE: LEGISLATION TO PROTECT ONLINE USERS

                                  ----------

                             TUESDAY, MARCH 1, 2022

                      House of Representatives,
      Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Commerce,
                      Committee on Energy and Commerce,
                                                        Washington, DC.

        The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:31 a.m., in
    the John D. Dingell Room 2123, Rayburn House Office Building,
    and remotely via Cisco Webex online video conferencing, Hon.
    Jan Schakowsky, (chair of the subcommittee) presiding.
        Members present: Representatives Schakowsky, Rush, Castor,
    Trahan, McNerney, Clarke, Cardenas, Dingell, Kelly, Soto,
    Craig, Pallone (ex officio); Bilirakis (subcommittee ranking
    member), Upton, Latta, Guthrie, Bucshon, Dunn, Lesko, Pence,
    and Rodgers (ex officio).
        Also present: Representatives Eshoo and Walberg.
        Staff present: Katherine Durkin, Policy Coordinator;
    Waverly Gordon, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel;
    Jessica Grandberry, Staff Assistant; Tiffany Guarascio, Staff
    Director; Perry Hamilton, Clerk; Ed Kaczmarski, Policy Analyst;
    Zach Kahan, Deputy Director Outreach and Member Service;
    Mackenzie Kuhl, Press Assistant; Jerry Leverich, Chief Counsel,
    Communications and Technology; David Miller, Counsel; Kaitlyn
    Peel, Digital Director; Caroline Rinker, Press Assistant; Chloe
    Rodriguez, Clerk; Andrew Souvall, Director of Communications,
    Outreach, and Member Services; Michele Viterise, Counsel;
    Caroline Wood, Staff Assistant; C.J. Young, Deputy
    Communications Director; Michael Cameron, Minority Policy
    Analyst, Consumer Protection and Commerce, Energy, Environment;
    Peter Kielty, Minority General Counsel; Emily King, Minority
    Member Services Director; Tim Kurth, Minority Chief Counsel,
    Consumer Protection and Commerce; Kate O'Connor, Minority Chief
    Counsel, Communication and Technology; Brannon Rains, Minority
    Professional Staff Member, Consumer Protection and Commerce;
    and Michael Taggart, Minority Policy Director.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and
    Commerce will now come to order.
        Today we will hold a legislative hearing entitled,
    ``Holding Big Tech Accountable: Legislation to Protect Online
    Users.''
        Due to COVID-19, members can now participate in today's
    hearing, either in person, remotely, or remotely online via
    conference, and in accord with the updated guidelines issued by
    the attending physician.
        Members, staff, and members of the press can participate in
    the hearing room, and are not required to wear masks.
        For members participating remotely, your microphones will
    be set on mute for the purpose of eliminating inadvertent
    background noise. Members participating remotely will need to
    unmute your microphones each time that you wish to speak.
        Please note--please notice that, once you have unmuted your
    microphone and anything that is--but anything that is said will
    be--can be heard over the loudspeakers. And so you don't want
    to do that.
        Since members are participating from different locations at
    today's hearing, all recognition of members shall--such as--
    such for--as such for questions will be in the order of
    subcommittee seniority.
        Documents for the record can be sent to Ed Kaczmarski at
    the email address that was provided to staff, and all documents
    shall be entered into the record at the end of--the conclusion
    of the hearing.
        The Chair now recognizes herself for 5 minutes for an
    opening statement.

     OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JAN SCHAKOWSKY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
                  CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ILLINOIS

        So today we begin the third legislative hearing of the
    Energy and Commerce Committee to consider legislation to rein
    in Big Tech.
        This subcommittee has worked long and hard to respond to
    the challenge, the challenges presented by Big Tech. But
    despite our scrutiny and repeated calls for change, the tech
    industry has not responded. Now is the time for change and for
    accountability.
        We know social media platforms can be used for good, and we
    have seen in the last week the heroic stories of Ukrainian
    people, and the amazing fight-back that they have shown, and
    courage that they have shown. But misinformation and
    disinformation are seemingly still amplified, and that is
    having dramatic costs for people around the world.
        For example, Russian state-owned media is targeting Spanish
    speakers around the globe with disinformation to--excuse me,
    when it comes to the--what is going on in the invasion of
    Ukraine. Previously, social media abetted a genocide in Myanmar
    and a deadly insurrection on January 6th.
        We are done with apologies and denials from Big Tech
    companies. We are done turning a blind eye when billionaires
    build economic empires by feeding Americans an ever-increasing
    diet of disinformation. It is time to regulate. So we will be
    considering five bills today.
        Ms. Eshoo's bill, the Banning Surveillance--excuse me. What
    does that say?
        Voice. Advertising.
        Ms. Schakowsky. What?
        Voice. Advertising.
        Ms. Schakowsky. OK, the Banning Surveillance Advertising
    Act, which I am a proud cosponsor of, to ban targeting
    advertising that can track individual users across the
    internet.
        Ms. Clarke's bill, the Algorithms Accountability Act, will
    require technology companies using the art of--using artificial
    intelligence to assess the impact of their algorithms on
    consumers--disinformation to--discrimination, rather, to--of
    protected classes no--has no place in our digital world.
        Mrs. Trahan's bill, the Digital Service, Oversight, and
    Safety Act, improves transparency for consumers and ensures
    that research can be--can measure the impact of social media on
    our society.
        Mr. Bilirakis's bill, the CAPTURE Act--that is the short
    title--studies whether law enforcement has the resources to
    keep us safe online.
        Mr. Mullin's bill, the Increasing Consumer Education on Law
    Enforcement Act, empowers consumers to protect the--them--to
    protect themselves.
        So as we refine these proposals, I have no doubt that can
    help create a fairer, safer internet, one that protects
    consumers, and who--and whose business model isn't rooted in
    disinformation.
        So I look forward to the hearing, and welcome all the
    comments of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, so that
    we can work together on this.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. Schakowsky follows:]

                   Prepared Statement of Hon. Jan Schakowsky

        Ms. Schakowsky. And with that, I would like to welcome the
    ranking member, Mr. Bilirakis, for his 5 minutes.

     OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. GUS BILIRAKIS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
                   CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF FLORIDA

        Mr. Bilirakis. Thank you so very much, Madam Chair.
        Good morning, and welcome to today's subcommittee
    legislative hearing, our witnesses.
        Today's hearing is the third in a series of what the
    majority calls ``Holding Big Tech Accountable.'' I am--I
    certainly hope the fourth will be on a national privacy and
    data security framework.
        For the December hearing, Republicans invited TikTok to
    testify as our witness, since they are not at the center--they
    are at the center of many of our shared concerns. But TikTok
    declined.
        For this hearing, I appreciate that the majority backed our
    efforts to invite the company, this particular company, TikTok,
    this time on a bipartisan basis. But sadly, TikTok declined yet
    again. I know this isn't what you want, Madam Chair. I
    certainly don't want it, either. So again, very disappointing,
    and we are not going to give up.
        Madam Chair, if we put our heads together, I am sure we can
    figure out a way to get this company, this particular company,
    TikTok, before our subcommittee, like so many others who have
    appeared as part of our country's democratic process. How very
    arrogant of them. But again, we are not going to give up. We
    need to hear from TikTok.
        The legislation today covers a broad range of issues, you
    know, not just hear from TikTok. We need to ask questions of
    TikTok.
        While I share many of the same concerns as my colleagues
    regarding Big Tech's abuse of power, I worry about proposals
    that miss the target and hurt other parts of our economy.
    Without more careful vetting, these bills will lead to a worse
    consumer experience, adversely impact American innovators and
    small businesses, and increase market dominance for large
    companies, specifically Google in this case.
        So far this Congress, this committee has heard from
    academics, industry experts, and consumer advocates, which is
    great. I am pleased that today we finally get to hear from law
    enforcement's perspective. They are on the front lines--and I
    know you agree, Madam Chair--for protecting our kids online,
    which is a primary focus in our fight against Big Tech. And
    thank you again for holding this hearing.
        I am proud to welcome Mike Duffey, a law enforcement
    officer based in my home State of Florida, who has dedicated
    more than 20 years of his career to protecting our Floridians
    and our Nation's children from predators and other dangerous
    threats online.
        Law enforcement's insights are critically important, as we
    consider multiple avenues to rein in the abuses perpetrated by
    Big Tech. I believe two bills under consideration today will
    help.
        First we have got the H.R. 6786, the Increasing Consumers
    Education on Law Enforcement Resources Act, introduced by my
    good friend, Representative Mullin. It will require FTC and
    attorneys general to develop a public education program to
    inform our constituents about law enforcement resources
    regarding online safety.
        The second is my bill--and thank you for mentioning it,
    Madam Chair, and agendaing the bill--H.R. 6755, the Cooperation
    Among Police, Tech, and Users to Resist Exploitation Act, or
    the CAPTURE Act, which will require the Government
    Accountability Office to research and provide recommendations
    on how to improve coordination and consultation between social
    media companies and law enforcement without creating
    constitutional issues.
        Some here may recognize the single point of contact
    proposal, as it currently exists in the FirstNet framework.
    This is a model I am looking to apply to tech platforms so
    Federal, State, and local law enforcement have clarity on who
    is reached reaching out to these companies in order to tackle
    harms online.
        Given the connection to today's Democratic bills have on
    privacy and data security, I know my friend, the Chair, will
    appreciate me once again emphasizing the importance of passing
    a national privacy and data security law. Even the House
    Administration Committee just held a hearing on a national
    privacy standard. We are all well overdue--we are overdue to
    hold a committee hearing because we have the jurisdiction in
    this committee, and I know the Chair has promised that we
    would.
        Madam Chair, I know these issues are extremely important to
    you, and the best way to protect our constituents online is
    through a national privacy and data security framework. It is
    time our subcommittee moves beyond these one-off bills that
    beat around the bush of privacy and data security concerns.
    Leader Rodgers--and she will--I am sure she will confirm this--
    and I remain fully committed to working across the aisle with
    anyone to enact a truly comprehensive privacy and data security
    law, and I urge my colleagues to join me in these efforts.
        Thank you again for allowing me to participate today, and I
    look forward to the discussion, especially how these proposals
    will help protect our kids online.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Bilirakis follows:]

                    Prepared Statement of Hon. Gus Bilirakis

        Mr. Bilirakis. Thank you, and I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you, Mr. Bilirakis. And I do look
    forward to very soon dealing with a comprehensive privacy bill.
    I think we are on our way.
        And let me now welcome the chair of the full committee, Mr.
    Pallone, for 5 minutes.

    OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK PALLONE, Jr., A REPRESENTATIVE
                IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY

        Mr. Pallone. Thank you, Chair Schakowsky. Today's hearing
    is the third in a series of hearings this committee has held on
    legislative reforms to hold social media companies accountable.
    The two previous legislative hearings covered reforms to
    section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and consumer
    protection-focused legislation to help build a safer internet.
    Today we will examine legislation to enhance transparency and
    further promote safety online.
        These hearings come after years of repeated bipartisan
    calls for social media companies to change their ways. Since
    2018 the committee has held 8 hearings on the subject. We have
    examined these issues from all sides, and now it is time for us
    to come together and to act. We are committed to working with
    our Republican colleagues on legislation to increase
    transparency, limit online manipulation, and improve online
    safety.
        And we all know how important social media is to our daily
    lives. It allows us to connect with family and friends to
    organize and to stay safe. And we are seeing that firsthand
    right now in Ukraine, as images posted on social media are
    exposing the world to just how depraved and misguided Vladimir
    Putin's actions are.
        Ukrainians armed with their smartphones are documenting the
    bravery of their fellow citizens standing up to the Russian
    military and the brutality of war. Social media is allowing
    Ukrainians to spread the word without any filters of the true
    impacts of this war. The images they are capturing on their
    phones are being shown worldwide, showing the world the
    atrocities being inflicted on the Ukrainian people.
        But at the very same time, we have seen weeks of Russian
    disinformation campaigns used to lay the groundwork for the
    invasion of Ukraine. These campaigns use propaganda to build
    support for the Kremlin and, unfortunately, they spread like
    wildfire online.
        And there is no question that fast-moving current events
    can be difficult for social media companies to respond to
    quickly. But that is their responsibility, and they must be
    held accountable. We must ensure they are transparent, and
    their incentives align with the good social media can do for
    people, and not the bad.
        Today we will discuss five bills that target different
    parts of the social media ecosystem to make platforms safer for
    users.
        One of the best ways to make these companies more
    accountable is to make them more transparent. We will discuss
    legislation that establishes an Office of Independent Research
    Facilitation at the FTC. This new office would help facilitate
    academic research on social media platforms to help us get the
    data we need on how these companies are targeting users.
        Another bill requires companies that use automated
    decisionmaking to conduct impact assessments on their systems,
    and regularly report the results to the FTC. Now, these
    assessments will help ensure that machine learning is being
    employed in a fair and nondiscriminatory manner.
        We will also consider a bill to ban the practice of
    targeted advertising, which includes a provision prohibiting
    advertisers from using information that identifies a consumer
    as a member of a protected class for advertising purposes.
        And finally, we will consider bills that will help social
    media companies work better with Federal, State, and local law
    enforcement to protect users who feel their safety has been
    violated online.
        Now, these proposals, along with the proposals we
    considered in the two previous legislative hearings, are
    collectively major steps in addressing the real harms caused by
    Big Tech.
        Another part of tech accountability is protecting people's
    privacy. I know that both the ranking member of the
    subcommittee and the Chair mentioned this, and have been
    involved with this, and we are particularly concerned about our
    children's privacy, as more and more apps are used by and
    targeted to our kids.
        I think every member of this committee agrees that more
    must be done on privacy, and that is why we have been working
    since last Congress on a bipartisan staff draft. Our work on
    that legislation continues, and I hope the Republicans will
    work together with us on that, as well.
        The bills before us today collectively address tech
    accountability. The time to act is now, and these bills can
    help us make the internet a safer place. And I look forward to
    our discussion today and, obviously, hearing from our excellent
    panel.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Pallone follows:]

                 Prepared Statement of Hon. Frank Pallone, Jr.

        Mr. Pallone. I yield back, Madam Chair, and thank you for
    all that you have done on these issues. You are--you really
    have been working on them for a long time, and it is--it has
    made a difference in terms of where we are today. Thank you.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And now, wearing
    her Ukrainian yellow----
        Mrs. Rodgers. That is right.
        Ms. Schakowsky. I want to recognize Mrs. Rodgers, our
    ranking member, for 5 minutes for her opening statement.

          OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. CATHY McMORRIS RODGERS, A
        REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF WASHINGTON

        Mrs. Rodgers. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        First I want to say, ``Glory to Ukraine.'' Several of us on
    this committee had the opportunity to travel to Ukraine, and
    were inspired at the time with their fight for self-
    determination and independence. And today I continue to support
    their fight for freedom, and I pray for their strength and
    security, and their freedom to prevail.
        While some tech companies have taken steps to prevent the
    proliferation of Russian state-sponsored propaganda, I hope
    that we too on the subcommittee will be vigilant in addressing
    how others, like Twitter, maintaining an account for the
    Kremlin; or TikTok, reinstating Russian, state-owned media, are
    complicit in spreading it, as well as other disinformation
    campaigns from Putin. This has real-world consequences for the
    Ukrainians and our other European allies.
        We all share the goal of holding Big Tech accountable,
    especially for our children. Big Tech platforms are my biggest
    fear as a parent. Nearly every conversation I have with parents
    in schools these days comes back to the concerns about Big Tech
    and our kids. It is echoed by pediatricians, school
    administrators, and teachers. Big Tech are not advocates for
    children. Our kids, the users, are their product, and they are
    being manipulated and exploited for profit. They are being
    exposed to cruelty, bullying, and induced to self-harm. These
    harms have been worsened by the move to virtual life because of
    government-imposed school closures and lockdowns.
        We must--this committee can and must--do more to address
    this crisis. If we are going to address issues with Big Tech
    and the advertising industry, that discussion includes
    improving transparency and accountability for how these
    businesses are collecting personal information, especially from
    our children. My Republican colleagues and I unveiled a privacy
    and data security framework last year. Addressing these issues
    in a hearing would help us make progress.
        One bipartisan bill we asked to be considered is the
    Walberg-Rush Child Online Privacy Protection Act update.
    Despite many changes being considered on the collection and use
    of data today, unfortunately, this one is still missing on the
    schedule.
        Also, if we are discussing emerging technologies like
    artificial intelligence, we should be addressing how AI can
    strengthen American leadership and reflect our values of
    freedom, human rights, and human dignity. These are issues that
    require time, education, and hearings to debate and identify
    common ground.
        A key component for many of these issues is the authority
    Congress grants to the Federal Trade Commission. The bills
    today proposed by the Democrats enact sweeping changes for the
    FTC. I appreciate that the Commission wants to be more involved
    in improving data security. We have been clear that we are
    willing to negotiate on additional authority, but changes like
    this must be given the appropriate time for discussion and
    vetting.
        We need to start by ensuring accountability and
    transparency from the FTC on its current authorities before we
    give them more power. The FTC should come before this committee
    to help us better understand how they would use additional
    authority, as well as provide us assurances it has its own
    house in order.
        For this reason I sent a letter to Chair Khan yesterday on
    the FTC's recent enforcement announcements for the security
    vulnerabilities found in the open source software--
    specifically, Log4J. Recent testimony in the Senate suggests
    government systems may have used Log4J, so we must learn
    whether agencies under our jurisdiction have system
    vulnerabilities that could be exploited specifically by foreign
    actors like Russia or China.
        Missing from today's witness panel is TikTok, who declined
    an invitation to testify. And it is not the first time. TikTok
    threatens the safety, mental health, and well-being of our
    kids. A recent Wall Street Journal investigation found teen
    girls are developing tics from content they watch on TikTok.
    This is alarming, and their complete carelessness with people's
    personal information is even more concerning.
        TikTok's ties to China raise significant concerns regarding
    the amount of access the CCP has to information of Americans.
    We know TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, is an extension of
    this authoritarian regime, and now we see reports that TikTok
    is allowing Russian Government propaganda to proliferate.
    TikTok operates with disregard for U.S. national security
    concerns. Our witness today, Officer Duffey, can share more on
    how they challenge the reach of local law enforcement, as well.
        These concerns about privacy and Big Tech are issues we
    have been leading on, and we look forward to working together
    to address.
        [The prepared statement of Mrs. Rodgers follows:]

               Prepared Statement of Hon. Cathy McMorris Rodgers

        Mrs. Rodgers. I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentlelady yields back, and the Chair
    would like to remind members that, pursuant to committee rules,
    that all Members' written opening statements shall be included
    in the record.
        And now I would like to introduce our witnesses for today's
    hearing. As you can see, two are here. Is that three in person?
        Voice. Yes, just----
        Ms. Schakowsky. Oh, three in person and one remotely. And I
    want to welcome Laurel Lehman, who is Policy Analyst at
    Consumer Reports; Katie McInnis, who is Senior Policy--Public
    Policy Manager at Duck Duck Goose.
        Voice. DuckDuckGo.
        [Laughter.]
        Ms. Schakowsky. I am sorry. Duck, Duck Goose, that is a
    game. Duck Duck Go. OK, sorry about that.
        OK, I want to also welcome Mike Duffey, who is Special
    Agent Supervisor in charge at the Florida Department of Law
    Enforcement.
        And Mutale Nkonde, who is the Founder and Chief Executive
    Officer at AI--excuse me, of AI at the--what is this, public?
        Voice. AI for the People.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Oh, AI for the People U.S. There we go.
        So at this time the Chair will recognize each witness for 5
    minutes to provide their opening statements.
        But before we begin, I want to make sure that I call
    attention for the witnesses that are testifying in person. In
    front of you, you--some of you have testified before, but if
    not, you will notice that there are lights in front of you, and
    the light will initially be green. The green will turn yellow
    when you have 1-minute remaining. And please begin to wrap up
    your testimony at that point. The light will turn red when your
    time has expired.
        For the witness who is testifying remotely, there is a
    timer on your screen that will count down your remaining time.
        And with that, let me ask Ms. Lehman.
        You are recognized now for your 5 minutes.
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you, Chair Schakowsky.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Microphone.
        Voice. We can't hear you. Is it on?
        Voice. Maybe closer----
        Voice. Pull it closer.
        Ms. Lehman. All right. There we go?
        Voice. There we----
        Ms. Schakowsky. There we go.
        Ms. Lehman. All right.
        Voice. Fine.
        Ms. Lehman. All right. Thank you, Chair Schakowsky.

     STATEMENT OF LAUREL LEHMAN, POLICY ANALYST, CONSUMER REPORTS;
     KATIE MCINNIS, SENIOR PUBLIC POLICY MANAGER U.S., DUCKDUCKGO,
    INC.; MIKE DUFFEY, SPECIAL AGENT SUPERVISOR, FLORIDA DEPARTMENT
    OF LAW ENFORCEMENT; AND MUTALE NKONDE, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER,
                         AI FOR THE PEOPLE U.S.

                       STATEMENT OF LAUREL LEHMAN

        Ms. Lehman. Chairman Pallone, Ranking Member Rodgers, Chair
    Schakowsky, Ranking Member Bilirakis, and members of the
    subcommittee, thank you for inviting Consumer Reports to
    testify today on the crucial matter of protecting consumers
    online.
        My name is Laurel Lehman, and my work at CR focuses
    specifically on platform accountability, so that is where I
    will spend most of my time today.
        For 86 years, consumers have turned to CR for answers to
    questions like, ``Is this product safe? Is it worth my time or
    money? What risks might it pose to my family?'' Consumers today
    grapple with the same questions, but about their online
    experiences. It is this platform safe? Is it worth my time? Are
    the goods I am buying from this ad authentic? Why am I seeing
    this ad again?
        Today's hearing grapples with this century's version of
    confronting the very same challenges that have driven CR's
    fight for a fair, just, and transparent marketplace all along.
    The bills before the subcommittee today seek these same aims,
    and we are excited to work with you to refine, craft, and pass
    legislation that can help us usher in the online ecosystem that
    consumers deserve.
        Consumers face a range of issues in the digital
    marketplace. In a nationally representative survey, CR found
    that, of the 94 percent of Americans who said they had ever had
    at least 1 social media account, 84 percent had adjusted their
    social media settings at some point to limit or filter content
    in some way; 39 percent had elected to turn off targeted ads;
    59 percent said that they had read news on a social media site
    they initially believed to be true, but later learned was made
    up; and 37 percent told us that they had, at some point, wanted
    to change their privacy settings on a social media platform,
    but didn't know how.
        And their concerns are limited to social media. They expand
    to e-commerce and the way that AI impacts their lives, as I
    elaborate on in my written testimony.
        Yet the digital marketplace is as varied in potential
    solutions as it is in its problems. Just as one no recall
    safety standard or warning label can unilaterally keep
    consumers safe offline, the variety of challenges consumers
    face online requires a range of evidence-based policy
    solutions, from comprehensive transparency to expanded use of
    section 5 authorities to approaches of consumer protection law
    to cautious, narrow changes to section 230, and certainly
    include a stronger, better-funded FTC.
        Auto and product manufacturers are expected to conduct
    safety testing, and CR can test cars and appliances for
    performance under stress to see how manufacturer claims line up
    with their advertising. Digital product manufacturers, however,
    have no such obligations to research, mitigate, or disclose
    risks or dangers in the ways their systems work. They are not
    required to publish clear community guidelines or terms of
    service, or report on how effective their enforcement of such
    guidelines may be. And they make no guarantees they are
    appropriately staffing and equipping the teams that--dedicated
    to keeping consumers safe from harassment, spam, counterfeit
    products, hate speech, and misinformation.
        Transparency will be fundamental to all such evidence-based
    policy. In particular, three different kinds. I talk about
    pipelines, processes, and personnel.
        When I talk about pipeline transparency, we are talking
    about what factors influence what a consumer sees online.
    Whether that is an algorithm, or whether that is an ad, what
    components go into that?
        When we talk about process transparency, consumers deserve
    to know the rules of the road. What can they expect from their
    online communities, and how can they expect those rules to be
    enforced?
        When we talk about personnel, we are talking about, when
    platform fail consumers, how can we make sure that platform
    whistleblowers are empowered to make sure the public knows? And
    also, how we are making sure that platforms are appropriately
    staffed to enforce their terms of service everywhere they
    operate?
        CR's test track can figure out how cars handle stress
    because we have speedometers. Right now no one can crash test
    ads and algorithmic recommendations, except the platforms that
    profit from them.
        But transparency is the floor, not the ceiling, when it
    comes to building a more responsible online information
    ecosystem. Platforms clearly require stronger incentives to
    take responsibility for the harms they compound and accelerate.
        Across consumer products, it is well understood that
    companies should bear responsibility for design and process
    choices related to foreseeable preventable harms. Meanwhile,
    YouTube failed to ban vaccine misinformation until September
    2021, when platforms like Pinterest had started as early as
    February 2019. CR investigations in 2020 show that Facebook
    failed--that Facebook had approved ads with COVID-19
    misinformation.
        Online platforms fail to take reasonable baseline steps to
    ensure their products are designed and managed responsibly.
    Consumers should be able to expect an online system where we
    can trust that platforms have values past those which they
    return to their shareholders.
        At the end of the day, consumers deserve a safe, just, and
    transparent digital marketplace that they can trust. Congress
    can and must work to pass legislation that makes it possible,
    and CR looks forward to working with you in pursuit of that
    aim.
        Thank you again for inviting us here today. I look forward
    to your questions, and to today's discussion.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. Lehman follows:]

        Ms. Schakowsky. Well, thank you. And now Ms. McInnis from
    DuckDuckGo is recognized for 5 minutes.

                       STATEMENT OF KATIE McINNIS

        Ms. McInnis. Thank you, Chair. Chair Schakowsky, Ranking
    Member Bilirakis, Chairman Pallone, Ranking Member McMorris
    Rodgers, and members of the subcommittee, thank you for holding
    this important hearing and inviting me to testify. I am here to
    discuss DuckDuckGo's privacy-protected business model, and why
    we need bills like the Banning Surveillance Advertising Act to
    protect individuals online and to reform the general market.
        DuckDuckGo is a privacy technology company. We believe that
    privacy is a human right, and that being private online should
    be simple and accessible to all. With one download of the
    DuckDuckGo privacy browser for mobile or the DuckDuckGo privacy
    essentials browser extension for desktop, we offer seamless
    protection from surveillance ads by blocking trackers. This
    includes our email protection service, our tracker blocker
    technology, and our private search engine, which is the fourth
    largest in the United States, and serves over three billion
    searches a month, globally. Our company was founded in 2008 in
    Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. And year after year, we have seen
    record growth, proving users' interests in being private
    online.
        DuckDuckGo is robustly profitable, and has been since 2014,
    thanks to our contextual ad model. Contextual advertisements
    are based on the content being shown on the screen, and not--
    and do not need to know anything about you. So if you go to
    DuckDuckGo and perform a search--let's say you search for
    mobile phones, we are going to serve you with ads for phones.
    It is as simple as that.
        Behavioral advertising, by contrast, is based on personal
    profiles from data collected both on and offline about you.
    Have you ever searched for something online, and then saw an ad
    for that exact same thing pop up on another website, or an app?
    Or maybe you thought that your phone is listening to you, based
    on the creepy ads that you are seeing online? That is
    surveillance advertising. And rather than finding these ads
    useful, a majority of Americans say that this is a
    misappropriate use of their data. And it is no surprise this is
    a massive violation of their user privacy and data collection
    expectations.
        And it is not just that. Data collection also results in
    additional harm, like discrimination, identity theft, fraud,
    scams, and filter bubbles. This same personal information that
    allows a company to target you with an ad also enables them to
    discriminate against you and others in the presentation of
    critical opportunities. And these harms are not just
    theoretical.
        For instance, the Department of Housing and Urban
    Development brought a case against Facebook, charging them with
    housing discrimination by allowing advertisers to restrict who
    saw ads based on race, religion, and national origin. This is a
    harm that was made possible, thanks to data collection for
    surveillance ads.
        Online surveillance also enabled advertisers to use
    Google's ad tracking--ad targeting algorithm to present more
    men than women with ads for higher-paying jobs. The practice of
    data collection, therefore, is not just about a user's privacy
    or data collection expectations, but about the presentation of
    critical access to opportunities and employment.
        Consumers should have an easy and effective way to avoid
    this surveillance. And as our history makes clear, internet
    companies can be successful and profitable with a contextual ad
    model. Studies have additionally shown that publishers receive
    very little significant increase in revenue by using behavioral
    ads. And in fact, many online advertising companies started
    with a contextual ad model, including Google. Until recently
    even, most of the ads you are seeing online were contextual
    ads. However, due to Google's acquisition of DoubleClick and
    Facebook's ad--Facebook's control of the ad duopoly with
    Google, there has been a focus on behavioral advertising, and
    innovation in contextual advertising has been severely
    suppressed.
        If data collection for targeted ads were banned, access to
    personal data would no longer determine whether companies would
    succeed or fail in the advertising market, meaning that more
    companies would be able to compete against Google and
    Facebook's ad duopoly.
        As surveillance ads result in measurable harm for users and
    little to no increase in revenue for publishers, we must ask,
    ``What is all this surveillance for, if it is not just lining
    the pockets of Facebook and Google''
        As a House Antitrust Subcommittee report and reports from
    governments around the world demonstrate, access to personal
    data enables Big Tech to protect and entrench their dominant
    status online, generally, and in the ad market, in particular.
    A shift back to contextual advertising, therefore, would
    significantly reduce Google and Facebook's inherent advantages
    in advertising and beyond.
        Our mission at DuckDuckGo is to raise the standard of trust
    online. We therefore support bills like the Banning
    Surveillance Advertising Act that would do exactly that.
    Consumers should be protected from the harm surveillance
    advertising and data collection cause, like discrimination,
    identity theft, scams, and fraud.
        We believe that getting privacy online should be as simple
    as closing the blinds. Therefore, we urge Congress to pass
    bills that allow individuals to easily protect themselves and
    would also have the benefit of strengthening the online market.
        I am pleased to answer your questions today, and make
    myself available to members in the future for in-depth
    discussions about this bill. Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. McInnis follows:]

        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you. And now it is my pleasure to
    invite Mr. Duffey for 5 minutes.

                        STATEMENT OF MIKE DUFFEY

        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Madam Chair Schakowsky and Ranking
    Member Bilirakis, and members of the subcommittee. Thank you
    for inviting me today. I serve as assistant special agent in
    charge of Florida Department of Law Enforcement's--crimes unit.
        I started my law enforcement career during the AOL dial-up
    days. And in the 25 years since, I have seen massive changes in
    the way crime is committed and investigated. In that time I
    have learned that, whether crimes are committed in the virtual
    world or in the physical world, technology companies possess a
    large amount of essential evidence law enforcement needs to do
    our job. But lack the regulatory framework that enables
    efficient and lawful access to that evidence means that we are
    ineffective at reducing criminal threats, preventing
    victimization, or getting justice for the victims (sic).
        My investigative unit at FDLE, like thousands of others
    across local, State, and Federal law enforcement, is in a
    never-ending race to improve our access to digital evidence. We
    need money for training and tools to access evidence we can
    obtain from devices that we seize. But we are also facing
    increased challenges with the complete inability to access
    digital evidence when platforms deploy end-to-end encryption.
    Congress can help us address both of these issues.
        I want to share today with you a few examples of the
    challenges we are facing. Service providers are subject to
    little or no data retention requirements. In contrast, the
    banking industry is obligated to keep financial records for a
    certain period of time.
        In one example of how this can hurt our ability to respond
    to a crisis, a young person was livestreaming how he was going
    to commit suicide, potentially in front of a live audience. We
    immediately contacted the service provider that we had received
    this information, and to try to attempt to determine where the
    user was located. We noted that the live stream appeared to
    have ended, and the content provider was unable to find the
    record of the streaming event. We had nothing to followup on,
    if it had not been for the family's own posting that they had
    intervened.
        The lack of data retention requirements frustrates the most
    traumatic cases we deal with every day, which is the child
    sexual abuse cases. Service providers do--who do identify CSAM
    on their platforms are required to report it to our partners at
    the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. An
    investigation then begins with an agency serving legal process
    to a company for internet protocol information in an attempt to
    identify where the activities were occurring. If the provider
    does not retain data, a user has deleted it, the child predator
    becomes harder to identify and stop.
        The lack of standard terminology regarding the exchange of
    legal process between law enforcement and service providers
    leads to great confusion. Unless the terms we use to determine
    certain types of data matches within the own company's unique
    corporate terms, law enforcement must engage in a lengthy back
    and forth, costing valuable time in an investigation.
        We have seen some service providers implement online
    portals that are designed to facilitate the requests from law
    enforcement. These portals have been helpful in terms of
    improving timeliness and security of data that--exchanged
    between both parties. The response time is anywhere from 1
    month to 1 day. This lag can ultimately be dangerous to the
    cases we investigate.
        Most tech companies routinely provide law enforcement
    information when they really need--in an emergency. But
    determining the exigent is actually in the hands of tech
    companies. As a matter of Federal law, we in law enforcement
    have the most relevant facts and content to determine exigency,
    but yet the companies are the ones who have the final say.
        In one example, an individual made comments regarding being
    excited about July the 9th, and wanting to do what Nikolas Cruz
    did. Cruz was the murderer who took 17 innocent lives and
    injured 17 others at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School,
    Parkland, Florida, in 2018. This individual's social media post
    had indicated they idolized Nikolas Cruz, and appeared to have
    visited the location where Cruz was arrested. Upon review of
    this information law enforcement provided the social media
    provider when asking relevant information about the user, the
    company unilaterally made a determination that they did not
    think the situation was an immediate threat at this time.
        Big Tech platforms create--Big Tech platforms have
    created--have transformed society in many ways for the better.
    Others less so. Users of these platforms should expect that law
    enforcement officers charged with protecting them have a clear
    path to the evidence they need to punish the guilty and
    exonerate the innocent. The establishment of regulatory
    framework includes standardized legal processes, guidelines,
    and address the issues that would benefit industry, law
    enforcement and, most importantly, the citizens we serve (sic).
        Thank you again for your invitation, and I look forward to
    your questions.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Duffey follows:]

        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you.
        And now, Mr. Nkonde, I welcome you for 5 minutes for your
    testimony.

                       STATEMENT OF MUTALE NKONDE

        Ms. Nkonde. Good morning, Chair Schakowsky, Ranking Member
    Bilirakis----
        Ms. Schakowsky. Oh, Ms. I am sorry.
        Ms. Nkonde. No problem. And Ranking Member McMorris
    Rodgers, my name is Mutale Nkonde, and I am the founder and
    executive director of AI for the People, a national non-profit
    that uses strategic communications to really insert
    conversations around the impact that technology is having on
    society into public life.
        I am here today in support of the Algorithmic
    Accountability Act that I have been working on, really, for the
    last 5 years, as an advocate, and something that I am happy
    that this committee is finally looking for.
        As a storyteller, the best way for me to really express the
    impact that machine learning protocols have on public life is
    through an illustration. So this committee is very aware of the
    dangers of social media and algorithmic decisionmaking, so I am
    not going to go long, but I think that this will be
    illustrative in terms of the need for this Act.
        In February 2022, Twitter users noticed that they were
    being shown ads from a company called OpenSea. OpenSea is a
    provider of NFTs or non-fungible tokens, which are parts of
    currency based in blockchain that can be traded. What these
    users were being offered were the ability to buy what were
    described as Meta Slaves. These were avatars of African
    American people that were put up for sale in the same way that
    people were as sold in times of enslavement during this
    country.
        Upon AI for the People contacting Twitter to say that this
    had happened, we found that the account had been taken down
    from the platform. But news reports found that, instead of
    removing that lot, what OpenSea actually did was just add
    Asians and other non-White Americans to their platform.
        How did those slaves get onto those social media sites?
    Through a process called machine learning that informs our
    algorithmic decisionmakers and decides who and what people get
    to see on their social media feeds. This is an example of the
    way the combination of targeted advertising online, racial
    animus toward non-White Americans, and machine learning
    conflates to create unsafe online environments for Black and
    other--Black people and other members of protected classes.
        The Algorithmic Accountability Act is important, because
    what that would do would be to introduce impact assessments so
    that an office within the FTC could look at this potential use
    case, and then decide. Is this in the national best interest? I
    would argue that it is not, because we know, from the
    investigation conducted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, one
    of the tactics of hostile nations such as Russia is to really
    incite racial divides and therefore, I would argue, undermine
    our national security as we divide against ourselves, instead
    of looking outward to protecting this great nation.
        I argue that the Algorithmic Accountability Act, and even
    its what I would consider in many ways to be companion
    legislation, the Surveillance Advertising Act, provide an
    online environment in which people from protected classes can
    be safe.
        AI for the People, as an organization, really does seek to
    highlight the numerous ways in which advanced technological
    systems--and as we are looking to things like the Metaverse,
    Web3, and NFTs, technologies that we are not really commonly
    speaking about, we need to keep the protection of civil rights
    in mind. These platforms are enriching the few, without
    thinking about the ways in which they comply with laws that we
    have already standing.
        And as I finish my remarks, because of intellectual
    property laws--excuse the background noise. I sit--I come to
    you from Brooklyn, New York. Unfortunately, this is a noisy
    part of the country, so it won't be long.
        But the one thing I will say is, because of international--
    intellectual property laws, researchers and advocates do not
    have the ability to look at the source code to understand how
    these decisions are being made. So the passage of the
    Algorithmic Accountability Act will not only safeguard those of
    us from protected classes, but also give us insight into how
    these technologies make decisions that really have incredible
    impacts on the lives of many Americans.
        I look forward to the discussion. I thank you for the
    invitation, and I yield my time.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. Nkonde follows:]

        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you, Ms. Nkonde, and we have now
    concluded our witnesses' opening statements. At this time we
    will move to member questions.
        Each member will have 5 minutes to ask questions of our
    witnesses.
        I want to thank our witnesses for being here today.
        And since we have witnesses appearing virtually, I need to
    ask my colleagues in the hearing room to mute themselves
    whenever they are not directing--directly speaking during their
    Q&A portion, so that we can clearly hear the witnesses'
    remarks.
        I will begin with my 5 minutes of questions.
        So targeted advertising is at the heart of the online
    consumer model--online business model. But it fundamentally
    violates users' privacy in a way that would never be accepted
    if consumers were actually given the choice. That is why I
    joined Representative Eshoo in introducing the Banning
    Surveillance Advertising Act, and this legislation prohibits
    companies from targeting advertising--advertisement based on
    personal information.
        So, Ms. McInnis, your company already bans targeting--
    targeted advertising. Can you tell us why you made this
    decision?
        Ms. McInnis. Thank you for the question, Chair. Our founder
    and CEO started out DuckDuckGo by wanting to serve answers--
    serve users with great instant answers at the top of the search
    engine results page. And he was really looking for his company
    to have a positive impact. As he was developing this company in
    2008, he saw that there was a clear need for private search
    engines. And so we developed privacy for the search engine,
    have been expanding our privacy options ever since.
        And thank you for noting that DuckDuckGo helps stem
    surveillance ads. We are working very hard to ensure that our
    users are protected as they do whatever they need to do online
    by blocking trackers in the first instance, so that information
    is not collected about them.
        Ms. Schakowsky. And is your business still profitable,
    without the use of targeted advertising?
        Ms. McInnis. Yes, we are very profitable. Our revenue is
    somewhere around 100 million per year. We have over 30 million
    U.S. users in the United States, and they span the whole nation
    and the political spectrum.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you. When you were asking whether
    people get frustrated when they see that there is an ad that
    pops up, you know, ``How did they know to target me?'' And
    people feel uncomfortable online because of that.
        In our last tech hearing we discussed the impact of
    whistleblowers protection at the Federal Trade Commission. I am
    so glad to see that provisions in Mrs. Trahan's bill to protect
    whistleblowers, similar to those in the FTC--in the FTC
    Whistleblower Act that she and I have introduced in November.
        So I wanted to ask Ms. Lehman, would consumers be better
    protected from online harm if the FTC whistleblowers were
    protected by Federal law?
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you, Chair Schakowsky. Absolutely, yes.
        We are excited about a number of the transparency
    provisions before us today. There is context that--as many
    transparency reports as we have, as much nuance as we can get
    into, as much research as we do, there is context that you
    could only ever get when someone can tell you why a decision
    was made. And so for that reason, whistleblowers are critical
    to providing that context for consumers.
        Ms. Schakowsky. I really don't have any more questions,
    except to say that we are going to move along as fast as we can
    to protect consumers from the harms that are out there, from
    the information that they don't want collected, and we want to
    do it in these--the bills that are introduced today that we are
    discussing, but also to move quickly, and efficiently, and,
    very hopefully, in a bipartisan way to do comprehensive privacy
    legislation.
        The time to regulate is now. The time to hold Big Tech
    accountable is now. We have heard over and over again the
    promises, the denials of wrongdoing that we have heard from Big
    Tech and, really, enough is enough. Consumers want to be able
    to safely and confidently use what they can online, and not be
    exploited as they have been.
        So I yield back, and now will--Mr. Bilirakis for his 5
    minutes of questions.
        Mr. Bilirakis. Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate it very
    much.
        Mr. Duffey, I thank you again for your testimony. Again, we
    appreciate the valuable insight you bring to this discussion.
        I don't know if he can hear me.
        But Mr. Duffey, we were having a little difficulty hearing
    you before, in your opening remarks. So hopefully we have--you
    know, we have fixed that. I don't know, maybe you need to speak
    into the microphone. You know, your information is so valuable,
    so we want to catch everything.
        So anyway, I have a question for you. I am gravely
    concerned about the crimes perpetrated on Big Tech platforms,
    such as the sale of deadly fentanyl on Snapchat. And I believe
    companies are not doing enough to help solve these crimes. I
    mean, enough is enough, as the chairman said. Not--again, we
    can't allow this to happen anymore. Kids are dying, for crying
    out loud.
        And so in fact, in our subcommittee, the Health
    Subcommittee, we had--again, we had somebody testify on the
    fentanyl crisis in December. And Chairman Eshoo agreed with my
    assessment that Big Tech companies aren't doing enough to
    coordinate the DEA on drug sales, in particular.
        OK, that is why I recently introduced the CAPTURE Act,
    which will help us to develop legislation to assist social
    media companies to better communicate with law enforcement,
    specifically in relation to events of imminent injury or death
    to individuals.
        So from your experience, sir--and I appreciate you
    testifying and, again, you are doing a great job in our state--
    so from your experience, how has Big Tech failed at cooperating
    with law enforcement to assist in solving these dangerous
    crimes? And I would like for you to elaborate, sir.
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative. Can you hear me
    better now?
        Mr. Bilirakis. Yes, we can.
        Mr. Duffey. OK----
        Mr. Bilirakis. Madam Chair, can we hear better? Yes, I
    think so. Thank you. I can. Thank you.
        Mr. Duffey. OK. So they have failed in the sense that I
    don't think what we see is some of the--they don't understand
    the trends that today's youth is communicating by on their
    platforms. The data retention, when we do----
        [Audio malfunction.]
        Mr. Duffey  [continuing]. Investigation, is an issue, and--
    is what they do and what they don't keep, and for how long they
    keep it.
        The content moderation, they build--what we have seen is a
    lot of these companies build a platform for one type of use,
    and then, as you explained, it gets used and abused for other
    areas.
        So I think the failure is the lack of communication in--
    between Big Tech and law enforcement to discuss the trends, to
    discuss the acronyms, and the use of emojis, and the different
    codes by which today's youth communicate.
        Mr. Bilirakis. Yes, sir, when you speak slower, we can hear
    a lot better, so let's try that.
        Ms. Schakowsky. And stay real close to the mike.
        Mr. Bilirakis. Yes, and stay close to the mike. All right,
    we really appreciate it.
        What more can Big Tech do, in your opinion, do you
    believe--again, this legislation that I filed, the CAPTURE
    Act--can help accomplish this?
        And then also, as I mentioned in my testimony, we invited
    TikTok to testify at today's hearing to answer how they have
    failed to protect our youth online. They again ignored our
    requests. OK, we are not going to give up, we are going to have
    them here, and they are going to have to answer our questions.
    I know the Chair agrees with me. She is the leader in this
    area. It is clear they are not investing the time or resources
    needed to adequately curb dangerous content on their platform.
        Are you familiar with the dangerous viral changes that
    populate the site, and how schools are scrambling to stay ahead
    of the harms to other students and teachers alike?
        If so, can you elaborate on how this has stretched the
    resources?
        And again, the teachers, the police officers, we can't do--
    they can't do it all. They need our help. So it has stretched
    the resources for Florida police, I know. If you can elaborate
    on that, I would appreciate it.
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative. I agree with you 100
    percent. The resources that we in law enforcement have for
    identification of these viral challenges is, a lot of times,
    brought to our attention by parents or school resources
    officers who are within the school system, who are listening to
    the kids, watching their activity, and hearing firsthand----
        [Audio malfunction.]
        Mr. Duffey. As you mentioned, we don't have----
        [Audio malfunction.]
        Mr. Duffey. We are left to prioritize the different types
    of leads which we can investigate properly, and then identify
    the ones that we can----
        [Audio malfunction.]
        Mr. Bilirakis. Thank you. I appreciate it. I yield back,
    Madam Chair. Hopefully, we can get this cleared up and
    straightened out, because I know a lot of members here, at
    least on my side, want to talk to Mr. Duffey, and get valuable
    information from him.
        So thank you, I appreciate it.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Yes. And now I recognize the chairman of
    the full committee, Mr. Pallone, for 5 minutes for questions.
        Mr. Pallone. Thank you, Chair. And we are here today, as we
    know, to have an open, meaningful dialog about solutions to
    address the harm social media companies have caused, and this
    is more timely than ever as we see social media companies
    expanding their reach.
        So I want to use Facebook as an example, which now goes by
    Meta. We have seen reports of sexual assault and harassment in
    the virtual reality world that Facebook is trying to create
    with the Metaverse. So let me start with Ms. Nkonde.
        Can you expand on this issue? What are some of the real
    harms that we will see as social media companies expand their
    reach, if you will?
        Ms. Nkonde. Thank you for the question, Mr. Pallone. The
    issue--just to read everybody in to the issue with the
    Metaverse as it stands, the head of research of the Metaverse
    recently wrote a
        [inaudible] article, in which she told us that when she
    went in, she was sexually abused by male avatars.
        The issue is, in order to get this immersive experience,
    what the Meta are currently doing, what their team is doing are
    investigating how to use light sensors to make it feel like we
    are seeing, audio sensors to make it feel like we are hearing,
    and tactile sensors to make it feel like we are being touched.
        Therefore, if you go into an immersive environment where
    you really feel that these things are happening to you, then,
    despite the fact that it is in a headset, you are still going
    to have that very real experience of abuse. And without
    regulation of what is called Web2, what we know of Facebook,
    these harms are going to be perpetrated further in the virtual
    environments.
        Mr. Pallone. And what about--well, let me ask about
    marginalized communities. How might they be impacted by these
    changes that we are seeing?
        Ms. Nkonde. Marginalized communities are actually the most
    vulnerable within this.
        And so the head of Metaverse research is a woman. She is a
    protected class. So what we were seeing in her attack by male
    avatars were really the logics of sexism and hatred of women
    being enforced in a place where you can reach your target.
        Another group that we are seeing more reports of are
    children in the Metaverse, which is a whole explosion of
    issues, specifically because people under 13 are not even
    supposed to be on that platform. And so, when we think about
    regulation, we need to think about who are the most vulnerable.
    Could disabled avatar got away in those situations. There is a
    history of racial violence in this country. If we see attacks
    on women, it is logical that we are going to see attacks on
    negatively racialized groups.
        And it is committees like this and the bills that are being
    put forward that are really going to keep us American people
    safe.
        Mr. Pallone. [Inaudible] instances. I mean, I think
    increased transparency would go a long way in making the
    internet a safer place, so let me ask Ms. Lehman.
        How would the legislation before us today bring greater
    transparency, and with a greater accountability, to these Big
    Tech platforms, if you will?
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you, Chair Pallone. So the transparency
    in the bill across the board today is a crucial prerequisite to
    really understanding and forming the kinds of harms we are
    seeing across the board, and being able to have that kind of
    context, being able to speak to the specific harms.
        And so the bills before us today, particularly
    Representative Clarke and Representative Trahan's bills, are--
    in requiring impact assessments, for example, and requiring--it
    requires companies to actually take account for what kinds of
    harms, what kinds of risks do we need to consider, do we need
    to think about, rather than building first and asking questions
    later, once the harms have happened.
        And I will yield back.
        Mr. Pallone. I only have a little time left, but let me
    just say we have consistently seen some social media companies
    withhold critical information about how their systems work from
    the public, which makes it difficult for consumer protection
    agencies like the FTC to address the issues users face online.
        Could you tell me, Ms. Lehman, how would these bills help
    the FTC better protect consumers from unfair or deceptive
    practices? But you only got 20 seconds.
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you, I will try. The short answer is it
    helps inform how we do it.
        Eight seconds? Boy.
        It offers so much more perspective to the FTC to understand
    the problems and, therefore, to keep consumers safe in sort of
    the mission.
        [Inaudible] seconds, OK.
        Mr. Pallone. I made you go too fast. Thank you.
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you.
        Mr. Pallone. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentleman yields back. Let me just
    remind everyone in the room, all members, to please unmute
    after you have spoken. Apparently, we are getting some feedback
    here.
        I am sorry?
        Voice. They have to mute their mic after they have spoken.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Yes, to mute your mic after you have
    spoken.
        And now I recognize the ranking member of the full
    committee, Mrs. Rodgers, for 5 minutes.
        Mrs. Rodgers. Thank you, Madam Chair. There certainly is a
    lot before us in this hearing, and I appreciate the attention.
    The Republicans also have--we have a couple of dozen bills
    around transparency and accountability.
        Clearly, there is action that needs to take place, and we
    have been working with a variety of stakeholders getting input.
    I know that, in committee, there is 35 bills that have received
    a legislative hearing in the subcommittee. Three have been
    marked up, and two have received the bipartisan support.
        I really believe--and what I want to make the request of--
    is that we work together, that this is a problem that is going
    to require us seeking input and support from a lot of different
    entities, Republicans and Democrats.
        But beyond that, I believe that we need to be hearing from
    the advertising industry, AI developers, small businesses, even
    the FTC, for that matter, on how this is going to work, how
    they are going to operate after this--what you might call an
    extreme makeover, FTC addition.
        And I fundamentally believe that we need to be addressing a
    privacy law. We need a national privacy framework in order to
    gird up what the whole space is right now. And so we have
    drafted legislation, and are anxious to work with our
    colleagues across the aisle on a privacy standard. Certainly,
    there is an opportunity to find some common ground.
        On some of the issues before us today, I wanted to start
    with Ms. McInnis. Given recent reports on Big Tech needing to
    do more to protect the people of Ukraine from the
    misinformation campaigns generated by the Kremlin and its
    still-active Twitter account, I have a couple of questions to
    give you an opportunity to reflect on DuckDuckGo's part in this
    debate.
        Does your company still maintain a partnership with the
    Russian search engine Yandex?
        Ms. McInnis. In light of Russia's assault on democracy in
    Ukraine, we have paused our relationship with Yandex.
        Mrs. Rodgers. Thank you----
        Ms. McInnis. Yandex was used to provide traditional links,
    meaning non-news links on the search engine results page, in
    Russia and Turkey.
        Mrs. Rodgers. Thank you. Given you raise revenue via
    contextual advertising and affiliated programs, are you able to
    say whether such revenue has ever come from Russian State media
    sources in this partnership?
        Ms. McInnis. I do not know. Our advertisements are provided
    through Bing's contextual ads program. And so Microsoft's
    advertising would have the best information about that.
        That said, we are--yes, I think that they would be the best
    ones.
        Mrs. Rodgers. OK, thank you. Do you--or how do you see we
    best address concerns that we have over Chinese-owned TikTok,
    and how it may be influenced by Russia via its alliance with
    China?
        Ms. McInnis. Thank you, Ranking Member. Ranking Member
    Bilirakis and Ranking Member McMorris Rodgers, you have talked
    extensively about the need to protect children online.
        Although we have that Children's Online Privacy Protection
    Act, banning the use of surveillance ads would, I think, help
    protect children by banning the collection of personal
    information, no matter their age, which I think would help
    solve for some of the issues that we have been seeing online,
    where dominant tech companies say, ``We are not sure if
    children are on our platform, we don't actually know that they
    are there.'' And so, if we are protecting everyone, we are
    protecting children more.
        In addition, I think having some privacy laws like the
    general one you mentioned, or the Banning Surveillance
    Advertising bill, which would--of course, would protect
    privacy--would stem the ability of platforms like TikTok to
    collect information, regardless.
        Mrs. Rodgers. OK. Well, I thank you, and I appreciate your
    engagement and your support on the legislation. Fundamentally,
    we need a privacy framework, and so we will continue to work on
    that.
        Officer Duffey, our law enforcement officers are American
    heroes, and I have personally heard some very sad tales of the
    role Big Tech played in tragic events impacting our children,
    and the pressures on first responders. In your--you reference
    a--exigent circumstances in suicide intervention. Can you
    elaborate on the subjective constraints that social media
    platforms put on law enforcement to intervene in harm to
    children?
        And can you give us a sense which social media companies do
    a better job in cooperating?
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative. Hopefully, we have
    corrected some of the audio issues.
        But the
        [inaudible] exigent, when we serve a company with exigent
    circumstances, it is left at their determination. We present
    them with the facts as we are given. Ultimately, each
    individual company is the final say-so on whether they
    determine there is a threat to a person's life or others----
        Mrs. Rodgers. And which companies are cooperating?
        Mr. Duffey. It varies. The last one that I referenced in my
    statement was TikTok.
        Mrs. Rodgers. OK. OK, thank you. I have run out of time. I
    yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. OK. Who is next?
        My colleague from the Chicago area, Congressman Bobby Rush,
    you are recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Rush. Well, thank you, Madam Chairman, for this
    magnificent hearing. My question is directed to Ms. Nkonde.
        Ms. Nkonde, you mentioned facial recognition in your
    testimony. The error-prone nature of facial recognition
    software, especially when it comes to identifying people of
    color and women, is extremely dangerous.
        In 2018 an ACLU study found that Amazon's facial
    recognition software falsely matched 28 Members of Congress,
    including me, with someone else's mug shot. We are seeing the
    real-world impact of this when, in June 2020, New York--the New
    York Times reported on the case of Robert Julian-Borchak
    Williams of Michigan, who was arrested by Detroit police
    because he was misidentified by facial recognition software.
    Later it was revealed that this software was used ``almost
    exclusively against Black people'' and was used even though the
    Detroit police chief estimated that it misidentified
    individuals 96 percent of the time. Clearly, this is a very
    serious problem with very, very serious and very real
    implications.
        Ms. Nkonde, can you please speak to the role algorithms
    play in these kinds of situations?
        Does the solution to this problem currently exist?
        If so, what needs to be done to implement them?
        And if not, what do we need to do, as Members of Congress,
    to address these problems?
        Ms. Nkonde. Thank you for the question, Representative
    Rush. Big questions. But yes.
        So the way facial recognition works is through a computer
    engineering protocol called computer vision. The training data
    are pictures of people's faces, and then the algorithm will
    take a face graph. So it basically measures your face in what
    we call facial architecture: color of the skin, broadness of
    the nose, circumference of the eyes, for example.
        The issue within the Gender Shades report, which kind of
    undergirded this idea that facial recognition technology did
    not work in the Amazon, Microsoft, and IBM report, found that
    the training data was using that of White men, which meant that
    when those same systems were used to identify non-White people
    like Mr. Williams, who you mentioned, it misidentifies us.
        Therefore, one of the things that Congress could do
    immediately is really take the Algorithmic Accountability Act
    to markup. Because through impact assessments, the FTC would be
    then able to figure out how--what is the efficacy of this
    technology? Is it recognizing Black and Brown people? Where is
    facial recognition being used?
        Because many Americans believe it is just in law
    enforcement, but they don't realize that when we use self-
    checkout, for example, in pharmacies, they are using facial
    recognition to figure out whether you have stolen toothpaste or
    not, whether----
        Mr. Rush. Ms. Nkonde, can you also include how it affects
    us African Americans in the area of criminal justice and
    banking?
        Ms. Nkonde. Yes. In the area of criminal justice,
    misidentification leads to misincarceration or arrest. And in
    the area of banking or finances, the IRS has just been stopped
    from using facial recognition in order to access our records.
    And if you imagine that African Americans are not being
    recognized, that would bar us from access to our own financial
    information.
        Mr. Rush. Thank you, Madam Chair. I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you, Mr. Rush.
        Mr. Upton, you are recognized for 5 minutes for questions.
        Mr. Upton. Well, thank you, Madam Chair, and I want to echo
    the remarks of Cathy McMorris Rodgers. I hope that we can
    develop a privacy standard. It is something that is bipartisan,
    it is long overdue. I know it is tough to do, but I think we
    need to proceed down that road.
        For me, I am a dad, and I am also a granddad, so I sort of
    like that Duck Duck Goose at the beginning.
        [Laughter.]
        Mr. Upton. I know where you were coming from, I think.
        But all of us want to protect the most vulnerable, and that
    is our kids and our grandkids. We want to make sure that there
    is every tool in that toolbox so that we know what is going on,
    and their lives can be protected, because it is no longer just
    don't talk to strangers. There is a lot of strangers that are
    out there. And that is why we need to make sure that those
    tools are there.
        And so, Mr. Duffey, I want to thank you for your service,
    for coming before this committee to help us understand the ins
    and outs of protecting our Nation's kids online. One of the
    concerns that I hear about most from my constituents--and there
    is a lot of them--is the way that Big Tech is impacting the
    mental health of our kids.
        So I just wonder if you can walk us through a step by step
    of how you interact with a tech company, and how does that
    change when there is a threat to a child that is viewed as
    urgent?
        And I would just recommend that you get as close to your
    mike as you can, because the--despite this being the high tech
    community, the connection is not all that great.
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative. I am getting as
    close as I can, so hopefully this audio sounds a little bit
    better.
        Mr. Upton. I knew it wasn't the Florida accent, I can
    understand that better than Louisiana.
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you. So really, that relationship with
    big technology is only engaged upon an incident occurring. In
    the case of a missing child, or the case of child sexual abuse
    material, or a threat of violence, or an act of harm, we begin
    that engagement with technology.
        Outside of that, other than some of the big technology
    companies, the startups and a lot of the newer companies, we
    have very little engagement with them. Typically, our
    engagement, when it begins, is through legal process as we
    begin to try to investigate the issue at hand.
        Mr. Upton. What is the value of the number of cases that
    your department looks at every year, and has it been
    increasing? What is--what has been the trend line?
        Mr. Duffey. It has been increasing. Specifically as it
    relates to the child sexual abuse material, we hear in the
    State of Florida alone--law enforcement as a whole in the State
    of Florida has received over 18,000 leads reported to us by the
    National Center for Missing and Exploited Children alone in
    2020. That means law enforcement has to put eyes on each one of
    those leads to determine the ability to investigate
        [inaudible] limited resources.
        Mr. Upton. And where was that number--where were you, say,
    10 years ago, or when you started? I know you have been with
    law enforcement for a while. But as I hear from my law
    enforcement folks, I mean, they just--they shake their head in
    terms of some of the doors that get opened, and some of the
    nasty stuff that really gets out there. How has that changed
    from when you started?
        Mr. Duffey. Well, exactly. When I started the--it was a--a
    lot of what--the work we did was through the U.S. Postal
    Service, because the online world didn't exist. And the online
    world that existed was not as widely popular as it is today. So
    we are seeing exponential increases as companies come online
    and today's youth and others begin to leverage this platform to
    communicate, which ultimately results in children being
    sexually abused online, sextorted, and
        [inaudible] their mental health.
        Mr. Upton. Can you tell us one particular story of where
    things worked out?
        Mr. Duffey. There has been a few where we have gotten
    incidences of somebody saying, ``I am watching a child being
    sexually abused'' or a child was abducted and, through the use
    of technology, we were able to work with the provider to
    determine the location where that child or individual might be.
    And through the use of technology, we were able to locate that
    individual to prevent further abuse, or recover
        [inaudible].
        Mr. Upton. And are you able to interact that with Amber
    Alert?
        Mr. Duffey. We very much so are.
        Mr. Upton. Well, thank you. Again, thank you for your
    service.
        I appreciate the hearing, and I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. I wanted to point out that there was much
    more clarity with the response of our online witness because
    you turned off your mic each time after you asked the question.
    And I would recommend that for everyone who is asking questions
    of our online witnesses.
        The--and next, Ms. Castor, I recognize you for 5 minutes
    for questions.
        Ms. Castor. Well, thank you, Chair Schakowsky, for holding
    this hearing, and thank you to all of our witnesses for
    appearing today, and a special shout-out to Special Agent Mike
    Duffey from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.
        Thank you, Special Agent Duffey, for your 25 years of
    service, and especially on behalf of crimes against children
    and online harm.
        The subcommittee has now held several hearings on
    legislation to hold Big Tech accountable, and the bills before
    us today by Rep. Trahan and Rep Eshoo, and Rep. Clarke are
    steps in the right direction. But I believe it is urgent that
    we move legislation on online privacy issues, especially when
    it comes to children.
        Passing a core comprehensive privacy bill is central to
    holding Big Tech accountable. And if we can adopt safeguards on
    processing personal information, tech platforms will have less
    of an incentive to use many of their manipulative and harmful
    techniques that are currently deployed to increase engagement
    and addict their users, many of which we have discussed in past
    hearings.
        So one of our witnesses--witness companies today,
    DuckDuckGo, is a good example of this principle.
        And with the online harm to kids being made plain over the
    past few years, I work--I have been working for a number of
    years to develop the Kids Privacy Act to provide parents the
    necessary tools to protect their children, strengthen
    enforcement so companies are held to account for improperly
    collecting children's personal data, and for misuse of that
    data. It also closes loopholes. It has--the bill has widespread
    support. It has been endorsed by the leading child protection
    organizations, parents, pediatricians, and privacy groups.
        So to my Republican friends, we really need bipartisan
    support on this effort. The UK is ahead of us. The EU is ahead
    of us. And even the U.S. Senate, they are ahead of the House
    when it comes to children's online privacy. They are now two
    bipartisan bills over there. And while we all know that the
    Senate is not known for action, they are ahead of us here. So
    if they can come up with a bipartisan bill, so can we.
        So I am really speaking out more as a mother than as a
    Member of Congress. I have really--I have reached out to the
    leadership, and I am doing so again because I am not going to
    give up. I am--my door is open to any Member of Congress who
    wants to enter into good faith negotiations over a bill that
    protects children's privacy, their safety, and their health
    online, especially in the face of everything that we know now
    about crimes against kids, the rising rates of mental health
    problems, and more.
        I mean, the Facebook whistleblower was here--also made
    plain that the Big Tech platforms, Facebook, Instagram, they
    know about the harms, but they are more interested in getting
    kids hooked and their profits than keeping kids safe online.
        So thank you for indulging me on that. But please, my door
    is open, and we really want to protect kids.
        So my question for the witnesses today, each one of you,
    yes or no, is a comprehensive Federal privacy law a critical
    component of Big Tech accountability and protecting consumers
    online?
        Ms. Lehman, you can start.
        Ms. Lehman. Yes.
        Ms. Castor. Ms. McInnis?
        Ms. McInnis. Absolutely.
        Ms. Castor. Special Agent Duffey?
        Mr. Duffey. Yes.
        Ms. Castor. And Ms. Nkonde?
        Ms. Nkonde. Yes.
        Ms. Castor. And here is another yes-or-no. Should there be
    special focus on protecting children's privacy, safety, and
    health online, yes or no?
        Ms. Lehman. Yes.
        Ms. McInnis. Yes.
        Mr. Duffey. Yes.
        Ms. Nkonde. Yes.
        Ms. Castor. Well, thank you.
        And Special Agent Duffey, you--Representative Upton asked
    you about a good news story, but tell us what you are seeing
    right now because of the--just the widespread collection of
    data on children and their interaction with online apps? What
    tools do parents need? What do parents tell you right now that
    they feel they need from policymakers here in Washington?
        [Pause.]
        Ms. Castor. Oh, Special Agent Duffey, your audio.
        Mr. Duffey. Sorry about that. Representative, thank you.
        Being a parent myself, and talking with other parents, the
    biggest issue we hear is that they don't understand how to
    implement parental controls. A lot of these companies implement
    the process. The explanation of how to do it is not clear.
        Ms. Castor. Thank you very much. It is obvious that we need
    to rebalance the power here, and put the power in the hands of
    parents, and not these Big Tech platforms.
        Thank you. I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you.
        Mr. Latta, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Latta. Well, I thank my friend, the Chair, for today's
    hearing, and I also thank our witnesses for appearing before us
    today.
        As part of the Republican Big Tech accountability platform,
    many of the Members in this body have proposed a number of
    reforms to the laws governing Big Tech. My proposal is to
    remove section 230 liability protections from companies that
    act as bad Samaritans and knowingly promote, solicit, or
    facilitate illegal activity.
        Broadly, I have serious concerns about some of the
    activities that these companies are allowing to occur on their
    platforms, whether it is explicitly permitting these
    questionable activities or simply ignoring any illegal content
    that they discover.
        I believe the legislation before us today misses the mark.
    H.R. 6796 would create a new bureau at the Federal Trade
    Commission with new rulemaking and investigatory authorities to
    define the code of conduct for online platforms. However, I do
    not believe it is the FTC's duty or responsibility to be the
    moderators of content on social media platforms. Rather, they
    should act as the clearinghouse and inform consumers on Big
    Tech's content moderation practices, including their
    enforcement decisions and appeals decisions.
        Additionally, the legislation would require the FTC to hire
    500 staffers. I can only imagine this undertaking would set
    back the FTC many years and further slow its rulemaking
    drafting process and its ability to protect consumers.
        Sadly, we aren't able to explore these concerns, as the
    majority did not invite the FTC to testify today. Fortunately,
    we do have the opportunity to hear from Mr. Duffey, a career
    law enforcer who has dedicated his career to protecting
    Americans from predators in the real world, and is now working
    to protect Americans, especially children, from predators
    online.
        And Mr. Duffey, if I could begin my questions with you, in
    your testimony it sounds like there were many instances of you
    being reliant on the goodwill of these tech companies to fully
    complete your law enforcement investigations. Would you speak
    about your conversations with these companies, and how would
    you characterize their concern for what is happening on their
    platforms?
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative.
        With regards to your question, the conversation is,
    sometimes with the newer tech companies, is it a loss. And what
    I mean by that is they don't understand the pure volume of data
    which they have, which makes it a challenge for us in law
    enforcement to ask for the specific information that we are
    referring to, specifically when we talk about the--what we will
    call the word game.
        When we begin to do our investigation, we serve each and
    every company with the legal process asking for specific
    content. If that content language that we are asking for
    doesn't match up with the exact language that they have, we
    begin this banter back and forth to try to identify the exact
    content we are looking for, which is--which--transparency on
    what they have would be greatly--you know, greatly enhance our
    abilities to streamline some of our process.
        Mr. Latta. Well, you know, one of the ways we can hold Big
    Tech accountable is increase the transparency requirements.
        You were just talking about transparency. Last year I
    released a discussion draft to require companies to disclose
    their content enforcement decisions related to child
    pornography, child trafficking, cyber bullying, illegal sale of
    drugs, foreign terrorism content, counterfeit products, revenge
    porn, and doxing.
        Do you believe that if law enforcement had more information
    about how companies manage or conduct enforcement against these
    types of activities, would it help you overall perform your
    job?
        Mr. Duffey. Yes, I believe it would. It would allow us to
    have a full understanding. I think it would open that door, and
    have the conversations with these tech companies that sometimes
    stand to the side. Having a better understanding by law
    enforcement would be a win for all.
        Mr. Latta. Well, thank you very much.
        And Madam Chair, before I yield back, I do have a letter to
    the--for the committee from ANA, which I would like to ask
    unanimous consent to put in the record.
        Voice. We just have to check----
        Ms. Schakowsky. Without objection.
        [The information appears at the conclusion of the hearing.]
        Mr. Latta. Thank you, and I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Congresswoman Trahan, you are next,
    recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mrs. Trahan. Well, thank you, Madam Chair.
        Throughout our country's history, bold reforms have been
    born in moments of crisis. The Great Depression forced Congress
    to create the Securities and Exchange Commission, tasked with
    overseeing and regulating the market to protect investors. And
    almost 80 years later, Congress passed the Dodd-Frank Act in
    response to the 2008 financial crisis, strengthening consumer
    protections against financial market abuse and creating
    transparency and accountability requirements for the entire
    financial system.
        Yet today, crisis after crisis created by large technology
    platforms have resulted in minimal Federal response. In fact,
    crickets.
        Under the leadership of Republican and Democratic-
    controlled governments alike, a handful of U.S. companies have
    become monopolies. They have optimized their platforms solely
    for ad revenue and, in turn, they have become breeding grounds
    for the spread of weaponized disinformation, hate speech, and
    content that harms our children.
        These issues have been closely examined. We have held
    hearings with experts, we have yelled at executives, and we
    have sent letters all saying the same thing: Do better. Yet the
    end result has remained the same. Nothing changes. And
    companies' stock prices hit new highs.
        The focus of today's hearing may be on the legislative
    proposals introduced by myself and my colleagues, but the
    question is much simpler: How long can we continue this
    inaction?
        How long can we look at our children and say the change is
    necessary, but we just haven't been able to enact it yet?
        Congress has gotten off the sidelines in the past for
    practically every other industry: cars, airplanes, and banks.
    We employ key organizations that keep pace with new
    developments, and inform regulations aimed to protect
    consumers. We must get off the sidelines once again. Enough
    listening to companies saying, ``Trust us, we have a process
    for that.'' Enough internal bickering that ends any real chance
    of progress. And enough watching Europe go first, and the
    Senate.
        I commend my colleagues on the committee, including our
    panel's leadership, who recognize that we have everything we
    need to act: the smoking guns, the historical precedent, and
    the legislative text. All we need today is the willpower.
        So Ms. Lehman, the Digital Services Oversight and Safety
    Act creates a bureau at the FTC, staffed with experts employed
    to issue rules related to public-facing transparency reports,
    certified researchers with data access, and disclosures to the
    Commission, so that we can shine sunlight on how consumer data
    is collected and used. Could you please explain why
    transparency requirements like these are so important?
        Ms. Lehman. Absolutely, thank you. Transparency
    requirements, particularly like those in your bill, we have a
    variety of them, right? So we have users and advertisers and
    individuals who need to understand what values the platforms
    that they use operate on. They--so that parents can decide is
    this platform--are these platforms' values coherent with what I
    want my kids to be on?
        And some of the most exciting components of the bill really
    are that we have seen time and time again that there is an
    allergy from the platforms to transparency and to
    accountability, whether that is Facebook disabling crowd
    sourcing, or disbanding the CrowdTangle team, whether that is
    other--we have seen the list that--and so, having access to
    understand, OK, what kinds of misinformation, how does it
    spread, how can we fix these problems, we don't have the
    context for that right now. And the parts of the bill that
    shine that sunlight make that possible.
        Mrs. Trahan. Well, thank you. And in your experience, how
    quickly do social media companies change their products and
    processes?
        And why is it so important to have a bureau that is
    flexible and nimble enough to quickly publish safety guidelines
    or issue new rules for disclosures?
        Ms. Lehman. Yes, I think particularly for--in this space
    things can change instantaneously. I think we think we have
    heard a little bit today about the Metaverse, and about, like,
    what Web3 and AR and VR look like. If we think back to five or
    six years ago, which is kind of a long time, in--sometimes in
    legislative land, right?
        You--what would--how would a--how could thinking through
    live video--and the advent of live video was fairly
    revolutionary, and the fact that video is happening on phones,
    and how did that change, and what kinds--as we heard from Mr.
    Duffey earlier, what kinds of harms can come from live video?
    Those are the kinds of things we need to be able to pivot
    instantaneously on, and--that we can't wait for.
        Mrs. Trahan. I couldn't agree more. Certainly, there is so
    much in the black box that we need to shine a light on so that
    we can keep up. Not just the Congress, the FTC. I mean, if not
    them, who is going to be armed with transparency in this
    regard?
        So I--the last thing--I know I am out of time, but I would
    like to request unanimous consent to enter a report from the
    NYU Stern Center for Business and Human Rights entitled,
    ``Enhancing the FTC's Consumer Protection Authority to Regulate
    Social Media Companies.''
        Ms. Schakowsky. Without objection----
        Mrs. Trahan. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        Ms. Schakowsky  [continuing]. So ordered.
        [The information appears at the conclusion of the hearing.]
        Ms. Schakowsky. OK. Mr. Guthrie, you are recognized for 5
    minutes.
        Mr. Guthrie. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. I have a
    letter from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. It has been submitted
    to your staff, but I would like to ask to enter into the
    record.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Without objection, so ordered.
        [The information appears at the conclusion of the hearing.]
        Mr. Guthrie. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you so much. And
    thanks to everybody for being here today. And my questions are
    for Mike Duffey.
        And the United States has seen historic levels of opioid
    abuse, leading to tragic deaths over the last several years.
    According to the Kentucky Office of Drug Control Policy,
    illicit fentanyl and its analogs were detected in more than 70
    percent of all cases in Kentucky in 2020. The opioid crisis has
    been exacerbated by deadly fentanyl being trafficked into our
    communities through our southern border and on the social media
    platforms millions of Americans, including our children, are
    using.
        The Energy and Commerce Committee has passed several bills
    to address this epidemic. One bill--I know it is in a different
    subcommittee, a subcommittee I have the honor of being ranking
    member--but the HALT Fentanyl Act.
        I mean, the idea that March 11th--after this expires--after
    the CR expires, that illicit fentanyl will be street legal in
    America is just wrong. I wish we could make it permanently
    illegal. I do expect and hope that we can work together to at
    least extend it, moving forward. But it is just absolutely
    frustrating that we can't permanently schedule illicit fentanyl
    that is--70 percent of Kentuckians who died of an overdose died
    of illicit fentanyl in 2020.
        But I am also concerned that--and where it ties into this
    hearing--that illegal drugs are still available online through
    illegal pharmacies, and even these widely popular social media
    platforms. This type of illegal activity online is troubling
    and inexcusable. I am working on a draft legislation as part of
    the Republican Big Tech platform that will help prevent this
    from happening on these sites by requiring internet platforms
    to implement and maintain reasonable content moderation
    policies and practices to address the illegal sale of drugs on
    their platforms.
        Additionally, the Federal Trade Commission and states
    attorneys general would ensure enforcement of these policies.
    So my question is for Mr. Duffey.
        In your testimony, you discuss the challenges that tech
    platforms present to law enforcement. Do you find that most
    platforms have a formal process or framework by which to work
    with law enforcement personnel?
        And do you think legislation in this space will enhance law
    enforcement's capabilities to track this illegal activity and
    facilitate?
        So what is the current status of these platforms, and what
    would you like to see Congress do, Mr.----
        Ms. Schakowsky. Unmute. That will help the--if you--we can
    hear him better if you unmute. There we go.
        Mr. Duffey. All right. Thank you, Representative. I do
    believe that any type of framework would be to our advantage,
    and a win for all.
        Right now, as the----
        [Audio malfunction.]
        Mr. Duffey  [continuing]. Out of Big Tech, and how they
    struggle to--they build a tool which is used by the general
    population that becomes popular, and then gets misused. And
    them addressing and having some framework and requirements as
    to having a group that is able to handle the volume of law
    enforcement compliance legal process that we serve, and
    mandating that they build out these groups to respond to our
    responses will not only help law enforcement investigative
    efforts.
        The other side of it is if these Big Tech corporations
    enact encryption, then we are back to not being able to
    investigate an opioid case where an individual has overdosed
    and now we can't get into that mobile device to identify, nor
    do we have the tools to try to get into this device to
    determine who that person was communicating with to potentially
    stop others from getting this drug, and work a criminal
    investigation.
        So having--first, having these companies be held
    accountable to creating a outreach or law enforcement response
    compliance group; second, allowing the law enforcement to have
    the tools needed to help fight encryption. And I am not
    indicating that--we are not asking for anything that we aren't
    entitled to with proper legal process. If we can't get into
    these locked devices, the person who overdosed, that child who
    overdosed on the ground there, we can't identify where the
    suspect may be.
        Mr. Guthrie. Well, thank you, and I just have 20 seconds,
    so I will yield back.
        I don't have time for another question, so I will yield
    back my time. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentleman yields back, and next is Mr.
    McNerney for 5 minutes.
        Mr. McNerney. I thank the Chair, and I thank the gentleman
    from Kentucky for yielding early.
        [Laughter.]
        Mr. McNerney. I thank the witnesses. Your testimony is very
    compelling this morning.
        Ms. McInnis, please describe for a minute or so how banning
    surveillance ads would transform the online ecosystem.
        Ms. McInnis. Absolutely, and thank you for the question,
    Representative.
        Right now, Facebook and Google control an ad duopoly in
    online advertising sales because they have convinced the
    advertising market and advertisers that behavioral ads are more
    relevant and serve users with more targeted ads than others
    would. There is no reason, however, why contextual
    advertisements should not and could not be just as relevant as
    behavioral ads.
        DuckDuckGo has used contextual ads for our entire existence
    to show users relevant offers in the moment. We think that, you
    know, while you are searching for sneakers, you are likely
    wanting to see ads about sneakers, and not an ad for a vacation
    you might have taken a few months ago.
        In addition, if this bill was enacted, many companies would
    be prevented from the collection of online data, meaning that
    their duopoly--Facebook and Google's duopoly--and ads would be
    diminished. Companies would be able to compete against them
    more forcefully in the market, and we would have more
    innovative, contextual advertisement services for users. And
    therefore, the ads would be more relevant and more useful to
    users in the future.
        Mr. McNerney. Thank you. And that was just a little more
    than a minute.
        Ms. Lehman, you argue that if companies are truly proud of
    how effectively they protect consumers, you would expect them
    to welcome independent investigators or researchers.
    Unfortunately, that is not happening, which is why a
    comprehensive approach to transparency created in the Digital
    Services Oversight and Safety Act, H.R. 6796, is so important.
    So please explain how increased transparency from this
    legislation would result in concrete changes.
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you for the question. So where platforms
    fail to take responsibility, transparency can flag issues. It
    can--and it can flag the extent of the issues, and how those
    issues persist.
        And the kinds of issues we have talked about today a little
    bit, we have talked about misinformation, we have talked about
    discriminatory advertising. We have talked about targeting ads
    to children, whether that--and targeting ads to minors. And
    there is a CR article last year about targeting gambling and
    alcohol ads toward minors. This is the kind of thing that,
    without transparency, we don't have a good sense of the scale
    of the problem, and how best to combat it.
        When we--with Representative Trahan's bill, we suddenly
    have the ability to make clear where the problems are coming
    from, and how they can best be stemmed.
        Mr. McNerney. I forgot to say that I am going to switch to
    DuckDuckGo tonight. Thank you.
        Ms. Lehman, in your written testimony it states that
    algorithms can be opaque, and even for the engineers that
    designed them. I have designed algorithms. I know what you are
    talking about. How can the Algorithm Accountability Act help
    engineers be more thoughtful about their designs and testing
    processes?
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you. So with the Algorithmic
    Accountability Act, it allows for--it makes possible impact
    assessments for--and so it forces, again, the consideration
    that platforms and companies utilizing algorithms don't
    presently need to do.
        And so, because there are so many different factors that
    can go into our recommendations or algorithmic decisionmaking,
    it forces considerations, and not changes, and not--but it--
    that--it is kind of a form of transparency unto itself, but
    it--forcing that forward is a crucial component of
    understanding what factors go into things that can affect
    everything from credit to housing to what ads we are seeing
    online.
        Mr. McNerney. Well, in other words, pre-planning and pre-
    specifications can help make algorithms more accountable and
    transparent----
        Ms. Lehman. Yes----
        Mr. McNerney I believe that.
        Ms. Lehman. Yes.
        Mr. McNerney. Ms. Nkonde, in your testimony you explained
    how predictions made through machine learning create a feedback
    loop that can change the course of society. Please elaborate on
    that. That is an interesting comment.
        Ms. Nkonde. So once a prediction has been made--for
    example, a wrongful arrest in the case of Robert Williams, as
    we talked about earlier, that person now has a false arrest
    record. But more importantly, their biometric data is within
    that system, and there is no way of taking back that bad
    decisionmaking. So that person's life has been changed, not
    just personally, but administratively. And they become part of
    a data set that is feeding back wrong information.
        Mr. McNerney. Thank you. I ran out of time, and I yield
    back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentleman yields back, and--yes, Ms.--
    next is Mr. Bucshon.
        Mr. Bucshon. Thank you, Madam Chair, for calling this
    hearing today. This is a really, really important subject.
        In the last few years, multiple reports and incidents have
    come out showing that America's youth has been harmed by the
    often opaque and insufficient data privacy and content
    moderation practices of tech platforms and other online
    services. I think we can all agree that that is true. It is
    extremely concerning.
        I have four children. My youngest now, my daughter, is
    getting ready to graduate high school. And during her high
    school years we have had to navigate this. And in our family,
    just like everyone else's, like so many other people from
    Indiana, Hoosiers, they have had to grapple with what the fair
    and safe terms of our online presence is with this in mind,
    because, if anyone has teenagers, they know they will be
    online, whether you know it or not. It is critical that kids
    like my daughter learn to safely navigate these technologies,
    prepare them for the 21st century life and workplace.
        I was a surgeon before, and I would like to--I always like
    to say these issues need to be addressed, I think, with a
    scalpel, rather than a hacksaw, in that there are data and
    usage restrictions worthy of examination by this committee,
    absolutely. Unfortunately, I think the legislation today, which
    is extremely well intended, probably takes more of a hacksaw
    approach than I would like to see, outright banning targeted
    advertising and opening a private right of action to let trial
    lawyers sue small business and local advertisers. I doesn't, I
    don't think, address the issue. Rather, we should examine
    policies how the FTC can better do their job as the cop on the
    beat to protect children from privacy dangers online.
        We are also reviewing a bill today that would drastically
    expand the government to increase the FTC by nearly one third
    of its existing size.
        So, Mr. Duffey, in your testimony you mentioned some of the
    ways that predators and other bad actors try to pressure and
    bully kids into providing information or materials that could
    harm them for the rest of their lives by putting it in
    cyberspace, and that never goes away.
        Do you believe that requiring platforms to be more
    transparent with their cyber bullying content moderation
    practices would empower youth users and their parents to avoid,
    oppose, or remove cyber-bullying content that can quickly get
    out of hand and turn into exploitative or even illegal content?
        Mr. Duffey. I do, thank you, Representative. I agree with
    you 100 percent that some transparency with youth, law
    enforcement, and parents would only add to the knowledge base
    that--for everybody on how to better protect yourself, the
    content, and what you are getting, what you are contributing
    when you sign up for these sites.
        And it would allow for us to have a wider scope to the
    overall issue when it comes to sextortion and cyber-bullying,
    along with the tactics used by these individuals.
        Mr. Bucshon. Well, thank you very much. And even--I live in
    Evansville, Indiana. And I can tell you, talking with local law
    enforcement there, this is pervasive. It is surprising. Even in
    rural counties I represent, bad actors every day doing this.
    This is just not, you know, in cities, big cities and other
    places. This is everywhere.
        Ms. McInnis, many consumers have already shown to be
    interested in not having their data tracked, as evidenced by
    the success of DuckDuckGo browser. But there are, obviously,
    those who have chosen to stay on the platforms that use their
    data. Do you think that encouraging wider implementation of
    privacy-by-design principles would give consumers the
    confidence that their data is being responsibly used, and could
    encourage more transparent practices in how a company uses a
    consumer's data to alleviate the concerns and abuses you have
    laid out by some of the advertisers currently?
        Ms. McInnis. Thank you, Representative. Absolutely.
        However, as the Chair and ranking member have stated, we
    have waited too long for companies to self-regulate, and we
    really should act now to incentivize them to act in the best
    interests of their users.
        Mr. Bucshon. Yes, I mean, so what you are saying is
    implementation--wider implementation of privacy-by-design
    principles should be driven by change in Federal law.
        Ms. McInnis. Unfortunately----
        Mr. Bucshon. Not voluntary.
        Ms. McInnis. Unfortunately, sir, I just think that
    companies won't be incentivized to do so before we incentivize
    them with law.
        In addition, I think competition reform bills would level
    the playing field, allowing more companies like DuckDuckGo to
    compete on privacy.
        Mr. Bucshon. That is a good advertisement.
        I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentleman yields back.
        Relevant to this subcommittee, the President is apparently
    going to talk about social media and children's mental health
    tonight, which is very important to us, yes.
        And next we have my friend, Congresswoman Clarke, for 5
    minutes.
        Ms. Clarke. I thank you very much, Madam Chair and Ranking
    Member Bilirakis, for holding this extremely important hearing
    today. And I would like to thank you for including my
    legislation, H.R. 6580, the Algorithmic Accountability Act of
    2022, which I recently reintroduced, along with Senators Ron
    Wyden and Senator Cory Booker.
        My legislation takes common-sense and long-overdue measures
    to protect consumers from harmful bias and discrimination
    resulting from the widespread use of automated systems that are
    governed by computer algorithms, artificial intelligence, and
    machine learning.
        Let me be clear: the problem isn't just Facebook,
    Instagram, and TikTok. The problem is pervasive. The very same
    automated technologies that are being misused and abused by
    social media companies are similarly being used without
    oversight by a wide range of industries to make critical,
    split-second decisions about people's health care, housing,
    finances, employment, and so much more. And while these
    technologies reach conclusions based on calculations, these
    calculations are the products of systems designed by humans,
    subjecting them to a wide range of flaws that reinforce broader
    societal discrimination, particularly against women and people
    of color.
        So Ms. Nkonde and it is so good to see you once again--
    could you share an example or two of algorithmic systems
    leading to discriminatory outcomes that have a major impact on
    people's lives?
        Ms. Nkonde. Yes, of course, Congresswoman Clarke. One of
    the most recent examples is a pain management algorithm that is
    used in over 1,000 health care settings in the United States
    that was discriminating against Black American patients because
    their health care costs were higher, in aggregate, than other
    groups. And it wasn't because of care. I can certainly speak
    about that more, but I know we don't have time.
        And then the second example was one that was brought forth
    by the Haas Business School at Berkeley that found that
    mortgage recommendation algorithms were discriminating against
    Black borrowers at the same rates as human beings
        [were], because the inputs that were being used, the
    questions that were being asked were asked discriminatory as it
    were a human banker (sic).
        So those are two of a myriad of examples I could offer.
        Ms. Clarke. So thank you. It is clear to me that something
    must be done to address the current lack of accountability and
    transparency around how automated systems are being used. And
    that is why my Algorithmic Accountability Act directs companies
    to assess their automated decision systems for potentially
    dangerous flaws such as inherent bias, safety risk, and
    performance gaps.
        Ms. Nkonde, would you agree that impact assessments are a
    feasible and important first step in tackling this issue?
        Ms. Nkonde. Yes. As it has been said earlier in this
    hearing, we are looking at impact assessments around
    algorithmic thinkers in the EU, and understanding the
    downstream impact of these technologies will be--will enable
    good faith actors on the public side to be able to decide
    whether this is actually in line with existing law. Because the
    harms I am describing are otherwise outlawed underneath civil
    rights statute, which we should be following if we are going to
    be--if we are going to follow rule of law in this country.
        Ms. Clarke. And Ms. Lehman, do you agree, as well?
        And how would these impacts assessments benefit consumers?
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you, Congresswoman. A little bit, as we
    mentioned earlier, having companies have to consider things
    other than their profits, having them have to consider how the
    systems they build have impacts on communities, on marginalized
    communities, on consumers across the board, inherently, even if
    it may provide more internal accountability and provide more
    external accountability as well, I mean, it forces those
    considerations in a way that we haven't previously seen.
        Ms. Clarke. Well, thank you. And my legislation would
    further direct companies to report their findings to the FTC
    for review, and require the FTC to establish a public
    repository of automated decision systems along with high-level
    information such as data sources and how to contest decisions.
        Ms. Nkonde, how would these transparency measures be
    helpful to consumers and researchers alike?
        Ms. Nkonde. They would protect our rights and enable us to
    make informed decisions around what we are actually buying, and
    the impact it will have on our lives as--on a whole.
        Ms. Clarke. Well, let me thank you for your testimony here
    today to all of our witnesses. It is time that we make a
    change.
        And with that, Madam Chair, I yield back. I have gone over
    time.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentlelady yields back, and now, Mr.
    Dunn, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Dunn. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I appreciate
    the opportunity to discuss Big Tech today.
        You know, thanks to advancements in technology, it is
    easier than ever to stay connected online. When the world went
    into a lockdown with COVID, our relationships could nominally
    be continued. And of course, essential businesses remained
    open. So social media, with American Big Tech leading the way,
    certainly was a boon to us, and we should absolutely continue
    to uphold an economic system that allows for innovation and
    open competition in the U.S. technological industry, especially
    for small and medium-sized enterprises that are trying to break
    into the market.
        Unfortunately, social media platforms have also provided a
    new space for bad actors, foreign adversaries to exploit the
    social media channels, to target potential victims and, of
    course, spread harmful propaganda. And these threats are
    heightened during the crisis like we are seeing now in Europe.
        Some of the Twitter accounts that were sharing information
    about the Russian unprovoked attack in Ukraine were curiously
    suspended from Twitter during the beginning days of the
    invasion. Twitter has noted that these accounts were moved
    removed by mistake, not due to Russian interference. And while
    this may not be an example of pure Russian aggression, we know
    similar reports will likely increase, and TikTok is already
    reporting a surge in Russian propaganda.
        The dangers of foreign adversaries using social media to
    advance their agenda is clearly a very real danger. Social
    media companies have a social responsibility to not allow
    malign State influences on their websites, and I think our
    national security depends on that.
        So first question, Ms. McInnis, we know China uses search
    engines to push conspiracy theories, and we know Russia is
    currently using propaganda online to spread misleading
    information in Ukraine. How does DuckDuckGo detect foreign
    manipulation campaigns such as this?
        And after detection, what steps do you take?
        Ms. McInnis. Thank you for the question, Congressman.
        First and foremost, the number-one thing that DuckDuckGo
    does to help stem disinformation and misinformation online is
    not collect your personal information. Companies that collect a
    lot of personal information, such as Google, are able to use
    that to further ensure that you are engaging in the product,
    which leads often to the presentation of conspiracy theories or
    other fringe videos that are presenting non-credible
    information.
        Second, DuckDuckGo got started as a search engine that was
    providing users with instant answers at its top-of-the-search-
    engine results page. We have continued to do that, especially
    with regards to information that may be targeted by people with
    ill intentions to provide misinformation and disinformation.
        And what many may not know is that the top of the search
    engine results page gets, by far, the most attention from any
    user. So by presenting users with credible and authoritative
    information at the top, we are ensuring that they are going to
    find the right answers to their questions, and not be steered
    away to another site that is looking to prey on their fear and
    misinformation.
        Mr. Dunn. Thank you for that, Ms. McInnis. Again, our
    adversaries also want access to individuals' data, so they can
    build algorithms to target, predict, and manipulate behavior in
    the United States.
        I am especially concerned about American companies that
    have ties to the Communist Chinese Party, and what data they
    are forced to share because of that relationship with China.
    You know, I think consumers deserve more transparency.
        How is their data used? Can you tell us a little bit more
    about that data? When are they forced to share?
        Ms. McInnis. Thank you for the question, Congressman. I am
    not sure what data companies are forced to share, in part
    because DuckDuckGo does not collect any personal user data as
    people use our systems. So by----
        Mr. Dunn. Well, thank you for not doing that. I
    appreciate--time is drawing short, so I am going to ask you for
    yes-or-no answers to these, if you will.
        Do believe that the amount of individual data collected by
    Big Tech companies is concerning?
        Ms. McInnis. Very.
        Mr. Dunn. Good. In general, is the data collected by Big
    Tech companies used to influence individual behaviors?
        Ms. McInnis. Absolutely.
        Mr. Dunn. OK, good.
        Mr. Duffey, we are going to give your technology another
    shot here. From your experience, what tools could social media
    sites implement to help users identify nefarious accounts?
        [Pause.]
        Mr. Dunn. Shouldn't have taken the risk, I guess.
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you----
        Mr. Dunn. [Inaudible.]
        Mr. Duffey. I think the internal tools that they collect--
    --
        Mr. Dunn. Mr. Duffey, go ahead. What tools would you wish
    you had from Congress?
        [Pause.]
        Mr. Dunn. A good computer----
        [Laughter.]
        Mr. Duffey. I would wish that the technology companies----
        Mr. Dunn. What?
        [Pause.]
        Mr. Dunn. I appreciate the Chair's----
        Mr. Duffey. Can you hear me?
        Mr. Dunn  [continuing]. Forbearance. I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Yes, I think we, unfortunately, lost him.
    Next is Mr. Cardenas for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Cardenas. Yes, thank you, Madam Chair Schakowsky, and
    also Ranking Member Bilirakis, for having this important
    meeting, and talking about these very good bills.
        I would also like to thank my colleague, Representative
    Lori Trahan, for introducing her bill, which would help shine a
    light on the content moderation practices of Big Tech
    companies.
        Without adequate transparency, we don't have the
    information we need to understand how disinformation spreads,
    and how to hold these companies accountable when they fail to
    make strong-enough measures to combat it.
        This problem is particularly bad in Spanish-speaking
    communities, where we have seen social media companies fail to
    invest the resources necessary to fight Spanish-Language
    disinformation. And it has come to my attention that Russia is
    feeding disinformation about what is going on in the Ukraine,
    specifically bombarding the Spanish-speaking community here in
    the United States and around the world. So obviously, they are
    trying to skew the truth, and trying to get certain communities
    to believe that Putin is muy bueno, or a good guy, and he is
    not.
        Thanks to whistleblowers like Frances Haugen, a former
    Facebook product manager, we know the Facebook--that Facebook
    directed 87 percent of their investments on combating
    misinformation to English language content, in spite of the
    fact that only 9 percent of Facebook users are English
    speakers. What a disparity.
        These disparities are unacceptable, especially when
    consuming misinformation can lead to real-world health, safety,
    and financial consequences for communities. And also, in some
    cases, people are actually dying based on what people are fed
    and the actions that they take.
        Ms. Lehman, would publicly publishing how these online
    platforms moderate non-English language content hopefully put
    some pressure on companies to correct the disparities and
    content moderation investment between English content and
    content in other languages? And if so, how so?
        Ms. Lehman. Absolutely. And I think, in large part, because
    those disparities, when they are said aloud, are so dramatic
    and so disproportionate, and so just incredibly disheartening,
    right?
        As the statistic you just cited, if it is 87 percent, even
    though it is making up 9 percent--even though English speakers
    make up only 9 percent of that platform, all sorts--all
    languages deserve the level of attention and the intensity and
    the appropriate content moderation, because all consumers
    deserve high standards of conduct moderation, and that when
    they are using a platform online, they can expect that their
    experience won't be different from someone else's simply
    because of the language that they are using on that platform.
        Mr. Cardenas. Thank you. We had Facebook in front of us,
    and other companies, and they admitted that they could put some
    more resources in there, but they choose not to.
        For example, McInnis, wasn't it earlier today that somebody
    asked about whether or not DuckDuckGo is actually profitable,
    and you said yes? What number do you--did you say that your
    revenue is $100 million?
        Ms. McInnis. That is correct, Representative.
        Mr. Cardenas. Is that per year?
        Ms. McInnis. It is per year.
        Mr. Cardenas. An annual basis? A year. Well, I would
    venture to guess that $100 million is a slow day for Facebook/
    Meta, Google, and Amazon.
        So I pray that DuckDuckGo can actually continue to succeed
    in this environment, because we are talking about companies
    that are now net worth $1 trillion or more. And the reason why
    I point that out is because they choose not to use good
    practices. They choose not to have practices that are
    respective of the consumer, respectful of the people who are
    using their platforms.
        And so I just want to commend you, Ms. McInnis, and please
    tell the C-suite executives at DuckDuckGo that I hope and pray
    that your model continues to work in this environment. And
    unfortunately, you are a tiny player on this playing field.
    Please take a second if you think that I am mischaracterizing,
    what I just said.
        Ms. McInnis. No, I appreciate your words, Representative,
    and we are trying very hard to compete in this marketplace. But
    as we have mentioned, Facebook and Google hold a duopoly in
    advertising. And the Banning Surveillance Advertising Act would
    help mediate that inadequacy in the market, and allow for more
    companies to compete on privacy, just like DuckDuckGo.
        Mr. Cardenas. Thank you so much. In 2020 a product risk
    assessment calculated internally by Facebook found that Spanish
    language misinformation detection on the platform remains,
    ``very low performance.''
        In spite of that, the report's recommendation was to--and I
    quote--``just keep trying to improve,'' and aim--and claimed
    that--and I quote--``addition of resources will not help.''
    That--nothing could be further from the truth.
        And the last thing I will say is, without public
    accountability, I think that these companies will continue to
    do the wrong thing, and we do need to have Federal legislation
    to rein them in for the sake of people's health and livelihood,
    and for the lives of the people and the children who are badly
    affected by these platforms.
        I am sorry I went over my time, Madam Chair, I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. No, I thank the gentleman.
        And Mrs. Lesko, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mrs. Lesko. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Before I begin my
    question, I want to correct the record.
        Earlier in the hearing Representative Castor had urged the
    need for the House to have a bipartisan bill updating the
    children's online privacy protection rule, and I agree we need
    a bipartisan bill. But such a bill already exists.
    Representative Walberg and Representative Rush introduced H.R.
    1781, the PROTECT Kids Act, earlier this year. And I understand
    Republicans have requested this bill to be included in the last
    two legislative hearings, but still to no avail.
        Furthermore, the bill was reintroduced from last year, so I
    am happy to say to Representative Castor that the Senate is not
    ahead of us on this particular issue.
        I also want to add that I understand that Leader McMorris
    Rodgers and Ranking Member Wicker have now asked the President
    twice on engaging on a comprehensive national privacy and data
    security bill--not just on children's privacy--and have not
    heard back yet, or there hasn't been an attempt to build a
    consensus with us Republicans.
        So I think we do want to work in a bipartisan area, because
    this is very important.
        Well, again, I want to say thank you to the witnesses for
    being here today.
        Before I begin my questions, I want to express my
    disappointment that representatives from the advertising
    industry were not invited to testify at a hearing which
    examines legislation that will severely impact the advertising
    industry. It seems that they deserve a seat at the table, so we
    can understand the effects.
        I do want to be clear, however, I have the same concerns
    that my colleagues have, in terms of Big Tech abusing their
    power and escaping responsibilities for their wrongdoing.
        However, H.R. 6416 will burden the small and medium-sized
    enterprises that are looking to gain entry into a market that
    heavily relies on advertising to be successful. The niche
    products created by innovators looking to capitalize on the
    American dream will not be able to grow or even survive under
    this legislation.
        I do not believe that was the intent of the sponsor, my
    friend. I know you care about protecting Americans' privacies,
    but let's not do it at the expense of small businesses. Yes,
    abusers like Google must be held accountable, but we must be
    sure to examine that actions taken to curb Big Tech's power
    will not unduly burden small businesses.
        The FTC has shown no interest in protecting good actors in
    the market, so that duty now falls on us. But these are the
    very same concerns that the Interactive Advertising Bureau, an
    organization that should be on today's panel, explained in a
    letter to this committee. And I ask that this letter--it is
    rather a lengthy one--be submitted for the record.
        And if Mr. Duffey can hear us----
        Ms. Schakowsky. Without objection, so ordered.
        [The information appears at the conclusion of the hearing.]
        Mrs. Lesko. Thank you, Madam Chair.
        Mr. Duffey, thank you again for your testimony, and for
    your long career wearing the badge. You raised many issues that
    we should be examining as we hold Big Tech accountable.
        Central to our goal is the Federal Trade Commission and
    their ability to inform Americans about resources they have
    when their security has been violated. As a law enforcement
    expert, what information would you want people to know about
    when their safety is violated on social media platforms?
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative. Hopefully, the audio
    is coming through a little bit clearer.
        To answer your question, I think today you would want to
    know, when your safety is violated, what exactly is the data
    that is--was available to that individual. Was it personal
    information, as it relates to your phone number? Was it date of
    birth information?
        What--a lot of times, when we see these social media sites,
    there is a growing concern amongst individuals that they are
    being encouraged to link their profiles to other social media
    sites. The question then becomes--is what data carries from
    company to company, and how does that impact the citizens that
    we serve every day?
        So I think, while a lot of it is we are used to credit
    reports being offered to people once they are--once they have
    been compromised, from a social media perspective, were my
    pictures taken? The big picture of what exactly was
    compromised, so that I can make a self-assessment as a citizen
    to what safety factors I am more concerned of.
        Mrs. Lesko. Thank you.
        And Madam Chair, I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentlewoman yields back. And now,
    Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, it is yours for 5 minutes.
        Mrs. Dingell. Thank you, Chairman Schakowsky. Thanks for
    holding this important hearing, and to all the witnesses for
    testifying today.
        In our December hearing on holding Big Tech accountable, I
    discussed how these platforms prioritized profits over people
    by keeping users engaged. These direct design choices have a
    profound impact on children and adolescents who are using these
    platforms, and we have seen an increasing connection between
    time spent on new media and mental health issues we are seeing
    in children and adolescents. In this increasingly digital age,
    we need to be vigilant in re-evaluating how these design
    choices impact children, and we need to work to prevent
    subsequent harms online.
        I am going to--I know previous questioners--my colleagues
    have asked some of these questions, and I am going to try to
    build on them. I want to start just by getting each of you on
    record with the same question I asked at the subcommittee's
    previous tech accountability hearing.
        To the panel, are social media companies conducting
    business online actively making the choice to prioritize
    profits and engagement over combating disinformation, violent
    content, and negative health outcomes for individuals and
    children?
        Just a yes or no answer, Ms. Lehman.
        Ms. Lehman. Yes.
        Mrs. Dingell. Ms. McInnis?
        Ms. McInnis. Yes.
        Mrs. Dingell. Ms. Nkonde?
        Ms. Nkonde. Yes.
        Mrs. Dingell. Mr. Duffey?
        Mr. Duffey. Yes.
        Mrs. Dingell. Thank you. OK.
        Ms. Lehman, are there ways in which the design features or
    algorithms of these platforms can take advantage of young
    people in particular, leading to worse outcomes?
        Do these design choices increase the likelihood that
    children will be exposed to divisive, violent, hurtful, or
    inappropriate content?
        Ms. Lehman. Absolutely. So right now we--a lot of what is
    most exciting about the transparency of things before us today
    is that there is not enough information to have a good sense of
    how exactly some of these platforms are making these design
    choices. We understand they are, but we don't know the
    intricacies of exactly how to fix it.
        A lot of this legislation allows us that insight, and also
    starts to force platforms to consider ways that their
    algorithmic systems are designed, ways that they are--it
    starts, as you said, when they are prioritizing profits over
    people. It starts to combat that, it provides--because,
    ultimately, they do need incentives to do so.
        Mrs. Dingell. Thank you.
        Ms. McInnis, what responsibility do tech companies have to
    protect children from manipulative marketing content and
    product recommendations and targeted advertising?
        Should these companies have some level of responsibility
    for a failure to protect our young users?
        Ms. McInnis. Absolutely. And thank you for the question,
    Representative.
        We encourage tech companies to take more responsibility
    over the kinds of tracking that they are using online, and how
    that tracking encourages other third parties to target users
    with misinformation, disinformation, and other offers that may
    be inappropriate, especially for children.
        Mrs. Dingell. Thank you.
        Ms. Lehman and Ms. Nkonde, do you believe that, without
    legislation, companies will take the necessary steps to protect
    children from manipulative practices on their platforms?
        How would the legislation under consideration today ensure
    that regulators and researchers have the tools and information
    necessary to protect children and adolescents using these
    platforms?
        Why don't we start with Ms. Nkonde?
        Ms. Nkonde. I don't think that any of the companies are
    incentivized to protect children because they are publicly
    traded companies. Therefore, their first priority is to their
    shareholders. This legislation would create that hand in the
    same way that, in the age of robber barons, Congress had to
    come in and create an incentive.
        In terms of transparency, knowing the harm allows us to
    have a targeted and appropriate remedy that can maintain
    innovation and business in the United States, while protecting
    our children, who, in my humble opinion, as a mother, are our
    greatest asset.
        Mrs. Dingell. Ms. Lehman, 20 seconds. Can you give us a
    quick answer?
        Ms. Lehman. Yes, I would echo Ms. Nkonde.
        And we know from previous hearings that platforms don't
    action, or don't action--maybe even three to 5 percent of hate,
    of violence, and of incitement, these problems are rampant, and
    I think if--certainly, the transparency would lend itself to
    public accountability for that.
        Mrs. Dingell. Thank you, Madam Chair. I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentlewoman yields back.
        And Mr. Pence, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Pence. Thank you, Chair Schakowsky and Ranking Member
    Bilirakis, and thanks--I thank the witnesses for being here
    today. I am going to kind of give you a background a little bit
    where I am at on this with some statements.
        Like many of my colleagues, I am increasingly concerned
    with the growth-at-any-cost mindset of Silicon Valley. Social
    media platforms employ algorithms that promote inflammatory,
    addictive content to elicit the strongest level of user
    engagement. You know, as we have talked about with children,
    that is a horrible thing.
        More clicks lead to more data that fuels a more lucrative
    online advertising business model. Efforts to keep users glued
    to their screen is at the heart of this business model. You
    know, we know that is true, because everybody has got their
    nose in their phone all the time.
        Our public disclosures have become overtly divisive. Our
    younger generations have developed unhealthy addictions to
    social media, and an individual's right to privacy is
    disregarded.
        The online environment of intrusive data collection
    inflammatory content is not the only option. I am encouraged to
    hear the conversation today and the level of agreement we have
    on problems facing Hoosiers and all Americans as it pertains to
    Big Tech. It is time that we start enacting in advance holistic
    solutions that will rein in Big Tech and produce real results
    to protect our constituents online.
        Our constituents should have more control over how their
    personal information is collected and used online, or--and this
    is where I deviate a little bit--receive fair compensation when
    their information is collected and sold, as it is happening
    absolutely non-stop.
        Ms. McInnis, in a previous hearing I discussed whether or
    not a social media platform could still be profitable without
    the ability to monetize content that has been adjudicated to be
    harmful to users. Likewise, DuckDuckGo is a profitable company
    that claims to not engage in surveillance advertising. Concerns
    have been raised that, if Congress limits a platform's ability
    to engage in automated surveillance advertising tools, small
    businesses will suffer from a lack of reach, which--I wrestle
    with that.
        However, as you referenced in your testimony, research
    shows only modest gains for the user of behaviorally targeted
    ads. I hear that a lot from the small businesses that use
    social media. Some it is good for, but the vast majority, it
    says it gets nothing for me.
        And yet, oddly, advertisers are very willing to pay a
    premium for what they believe extends their reach. Is it reach,
    or extends their data collection?
        If the outcome for online advertising is similar to what
    you can expect from other methods, the only difference becomes
    the amount of information Google or Facebook or any of the
    other Big Tech can gather from you and your business, or you
    personally. What has the experience been like at DuckDuckGo for
    small businesses seeking to advertise their products to
    potential consumers, from your perspective?
        Ms. McInnis. Thank you for the question, Representative.
        Unfortunately, we syndicate our contextual ads through
    Microsoft. So Microsoft would have the best data on how small
    businesses have utilized the platform. That said, DuckDuckGo is
    a smaller tech company that is competing against the giants. We
    also use contextual ads, and we have used the contextual ads on
    our services, as well. So we have proven that this is a
    profitable model for us.
        In addition, many small businesses have been using
    contextual ads to their benefit.
        Finally, as I mentioned earlier, the ability to
    discriminate in the targeting of advertisements also enables
    companies to discriminate in the opportunities that they
    present to users, meaning that some smaller businesses may be
    discriminated against in the provision of financial resources,
    rental opportunities, housing agreements, and other things that
    make their small business possible.
        Mr. Pence. Well, I would even say--I appreciate that
    comment. I would even say in sales, too, they get limited. It
    depends on who is collecting the data, and who they are
    dispersing that data to. It is a real problem for me.
        Ms. Nkonde, what is your answer to that same question? And
    that question was your experience with small businesses, the
    value there. Are they making money off this data collection of
    Big Tech?
        Ms. Nkonde. I would actually agree with your assessment
    that the returns are actually on the tech company side, in
    terms of more data. Because with more data, you can create more
    products, you have more insight. And the rate of return can be
    negligible.
        But that is not to say all the time. There are some
    businesses that are able to benefit, but not in the same way
    that the big giants do.
        Mr. Pence. Yes, thank you for that. You know, I think it is
    time we stop talking about being--us receiving some benefit for
    all the data that is being collected on us.
        And thank you, Madam Chair, I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentleman yields back. And now my
    colleague from Illinois, Congresswoman Kelly, for 5 minutes.
        Ms. Kelly. Thank you, Chair Schakowsky, for holding this
    hearing today, and for the witnesses appearing before us.
        I am delighted to see that one of the bills recommended by
    the E&C Racial Equity Working Group, the Algorithmic
    Accountability Act, will be considered here today.
        Every day people go online and search or buy products, and
    all the while, little bits of their activity get collected and
    put toward creating an online profile of a user's wants, likes,
    and dislikes. In the real world, more and more decisions are
    being made by artificial intelligence from data collected from
    what we do online. Large amounts of data are combined to make
    predictions with little knowledge of the underlying data used
    to train the algorithm, or the potential bias that is encoded
    in the system. One of the more difficult conversations to have
    around AI--what it means for AI to be transparent or
    explainable.
        Ms. Nkonde, in an interview last year with Stanford's
    Engineering's The Future of Everything podcast, you mentioned
    that impact assessment information would be more useful than
    opening up an algorithm and seeing what is inside. Can you
    elaborate on this?
        Is it either or--is it an either/or situation, or how would
    the Algorithmic Accountability Act--how would it help biases in
    how algorithms are designed and the outcomes they produce?
        Ms. Nkonde. Congresswoman Kelly, I would suggest that,
    because we are looking for accountability, the impact of the
    technology is way more important than the longitudinal algebra
    that it took to create the algorithm, because those statistical
    models are going to be visible to very few people in the
    population.
        And from an oversight perspective, Congress just needs to
    know, are these products in line of the laws of our land? And
    for that you just need impact.
        Ms. Kelly. Thank you.
        Ms. Lehman, in your testimony you point out the imbalance
    that the FTC often faces going up against some of the largest
    tech companies in the world. The Digital Services Oversight and
    Safety Act and the Algorithmic Accountability Act include
    increased FTC staffs and funding, albeit at different levels.
        Can you explain how the current imbalance of FTC staffing
    harms the ability of the government to stop bad actors?
        Ms. Lehman. Absolutely. Thank you, Congresswoman.
        So the FTC today is a fraction of the size it was 40 years
    ago, even while the economies from some of the largest
    platforms alone were unthinkable at that time. And so the kinds
    of resources that the FTC has to combat the systemic problems
    throughout these--throughout this industry is--the fact that we
    are still smaller than--compared to the outsized growth there,
    it--we can only--consumers will only benefit from a fully
    empowered FTC that can--that has the level of expertise and
    funding to effectively go after these industries.
        Ms. Kelly. Thank you.
        And Ms. McInnis, do you have anything to add?
        Ms. McInnis. We likewise support a fully funded and
    resourced Federal Trade Commission.
        One of the best things that the Federal Trade Commission
    and, indeed, the U.S. Government could do right now is enforce
    our existing rules and laws. And so we encourage the Federal
    Trade Commission to not only enforce their laws, but also
    consider where they could act to protect users, perhaps through
    examining new rules under the Children's Online Privacy
    Protective (sic) Act, or acting against patterns that we are
    seeing online under their section 5 authority.
        Ms. Kelly. Thank you. The European Union has already
    started their work toward an AI law. Their bills differ in many
    ways from the bills being considered today, but share some
    important similarities.
        Ms. Lehman, how would the Algorithmic Accountability Act
    align with European efforts to regulate AI, and how do they
    differ on taking risk-based approaches?
        Ms. Lehman. Thank you, Congresswoman.
        So in the EU there have been proposed legislation--there
    has been proposed regulation that would put algorithms into
    different risk buckets. And so this is where they differ
    insofar as they would go so far as to ban algorithms in the use
    of, like, the highest risk buckets, thinking more about, like,
    social credit scoring. There would be more regulations around
    how they can be used in some of the medium-risk buckets, and
    transparency in the lowest-risk buckets.
        We are a little bit earlier on in our AI regulation
    discussions, and so are--in the U.S., the--we--the primary
    mechanism we have right now in the Algorithmic Accountability
    Act is impact assessments and that transparency. So getting a
    sense of, OK, what are the effects of these systems.
        Ms. Kelly. Thank you.
        And with that, Madam Chair, I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. And next I call on Mr. Soto for his 5
    minutes.
        Mr. Soto, the floor is yours.
        Mr. Soto. Thank you, Madam Chair. When we look at 7 in 10
    Americans using social media platforms--that actually even
    sounds pretty low for me; most people I know use social media,
    right?
        And the practice of sharing user data to target
    advertisements has led to discrimination based upon race and
    gender on occasion. Forty-two percent of Americans experienced
    online harassment over the past year, forty-two percent. And
    social media companies have consistently denied and blocked the
    needed data for us to do independent research and government
    research.
        But there is hope, right? Because, while we know so many
    Americans are using social media, privacy online is an issue
    that affects most Americans. And the big headline from this
    hearing today is that the Energy and Commerce Committee,
    Democrats and Republicans, are coming together to propose
    bipartisan agendas, bipartisan bills to protect America's
    privacy online.
        And Madam Chair, I thank you and the ranking member for--my
    fellow Floridian, Gus Bilirakis, for your leadership on this,
    the Banning Surveillance Advertising Act of 2021. It prohibited
    advertisers from targeting advertisements based upon personal
    information that links the consumer's connected device,
    basically hunting down who you are by your device, rather than
    by your preferences and what you avail yourself to online.
        The second bill, the Algorithm (sic) Accountability Act of
    2022, which would conduct impact assessments on the algorithms
    that are mysterious to so many folks, and have regular
    reporting of these results to the Federal Trade Commission to
    make sure they are fair against discrimination, against anti-
    consumer issues, against all sorts of nefarious things that can
    happen if we leave it just to machines to make these decisions.
        The third bill, Cooperation Among Police, Tech, and Users
    to Resist Exploitation Act, or the CAPTURE Act. I want to give
    a compliment to my fellow Floridian, the ranking member, Gus
    Bilirakis, on this great bill on how social media companies
    communicate, consult, and coordinate with Federal, State, and
    local law enforcement to address illegal content and activity
    online. We have to protect our kids, we have to protect our
    families.
        My wife is an assistant principal in central Florida, and
    we see kids being exposed to adult content that has really hurt
    their childhood, and has made it harder on educators, and
    particularly on parents.
        Increasing consumer education of law enforcement resources,
    by Representative Mullin, that requires the FTC to work with
    the attorney generals to develop educational programs to inform
    the public on resources available, should they feel their
    safety or security was violated. Right now, many Americans
    don't know where to go, and this is a key part.
        And then finally, the Digital Services Oversight and Safety
    Act of 2022, which establishes the Bureau of Digital Services
    Oversight and Safety, a long-time need at the FTC to beef up
    their oversight of social media platforms under the FTC.
        Thank you, Special Agent Duffey, for being here. Welcome
    from Florida, at least virtually. We appreciate you testifying
    today. What other types of criminal acts and dangers do you see
    online from Floridians, from your role at FDLE?
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative.
        [Pause.]
        Mr. Duffey. Can you hear me?
        Mr. Soto. Yes, we could hear you. So what are the types of
    criminal acts online that you end up seeing in Florida, and the
    dangers?
        Mr. Duffey. We see everything that you could think of, and
    more. There is not a day that goes by that we aren't learning
    something new. Everything from the drug trade to individuals
    selling other--personal information from other people's
    accounts. It has really become the modern day means of
    communication amongst all criminal activity. They establish
    groups using different platforms, leveraging encryption
    services to hide behind a curtain that we are not privy to.
        So it is increasingly becoming a challenge, as you
    mentioned, with today's youth, and the content that they get
    exposed to on a daily basis, the mental health impact that it
    has on them, and the lack of oversight in the amount of content
    that they view is growing each and every day.
        So if you can think of a criminal activity, from selling
    somebody's house that they live in, to compromising a bank
    account, to title fraud, car fraud, it is all occurring in the
    digital environment.
        Mr. Soto. Thank you, Special Agent Duffey. Together we can
    empower parents, families, educators, consumers, prevent
    discrimination with this critical agenda.
        And I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentleman yields back. And now,
    Congresswoman Craig, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
        Ms. Craig. Thank you so much, Madam Chair, for yielding.
        Ms. Lehman, I want to start by thanking you for providing
    such thoughtful and helpful testimony across so many different
    areas related to holding Big Tech accountable, and for calling
    out Snapchat in your section 230 reform ideas.
        I have raised my concerns about Snapchat serving as an
    illegal marketplace for drugs in prior Big Tech hearings, and I
    want to continue my focus on the issue during today's hearing,
    as well.
        As my colleagues may recall, I have a constituent in
    Hastings, Minnesota, Bridgette Norring, who--she and her family
    lost their son, Devin, to a fentanyl overdose, and is asking us
    to do more. I am here today raising her voice and that of
    countless other parents in hopes that we can come together and
    find a solution.
        Special Agent Duffy, thank you for what you do in law
    enforcement every single day to help to crack down on these
    illegal online sales. I strongly believe we need to give our
    law enforcement agencies the tools, resources, and funding they
    need to help protect our communities, both online and in the
    physical world, from dangerous drug overdoses.
        You may have seen recent news stories online talking about
    changes Snapchat was taking to curb drug dealing on the app,
    under pressure from parents like Bridgette and other parents
    who called on the CEO to do more and do better. Based on your
    experience, though, Agent Duffey, and in training those who use
    apps to conduct investigations, I am hoping you can briefly
    walk us through what the current process looks like when you
    attempt to target a known drug dealer and hold them to account
    on an app like Snapchat.
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative.
        When we begin these types of investigations with companies
    like Snapchat, we are often times the ones being provided it
    through a citizen that becomes concerned. And in some cases,
    some companies will police themselves and identify content. But
    ultimately, they are seemingly less proactive in trying to
    remove some of this content, and leaving it for law enforcement
    to become proactive on their own site, which is a challenge as
    we struggle with retention of law enforcement officers around
    the United States.
        So these investigations begin with us identifying a
    criminal activity. Then we begin to serve legal process, which
    becomes the first hurdle in trying to identify what the company
    has retained or what they haven't retained, which becomes the
    first struggle.
        And then, as we progress through the app, we end up at
    internet service providers and cellular providers, because the
    means of using these apps are done through mobile devices. And
    so the mobile device itself, through the companies that provide
    the service, we run again into another issue of data retention
    and activity that may or may not be kept, along with these
    criminal activities being used with a virtual private network,
    meaning they are using a service that ultimately hides their
    internet activity in which no records are often found.
        So we have run into many roadblocks. I would say we have
    less successes than we have incomplete cases because of those
    things that I mentioned.
        Ms. Craig. Special Agent Duffey, you mentioned that the
    Snapchat or other platforms sometimes will proactively contact
    law enforcement, but most of the time it is citizens who are
    doing the trolling on these platforms and contacting you. And I
    would assume that, often times, that is because a family member
    has suffered some sort of catastrophic outcome, or at least
    some harm.
        What do you think the responsibility of the social media
    platforms should be, in terms of being proactive on their
    platform?
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you. I think the responsibility is all in
    their favor. They should be the ones content moderating. They
    should be the ones communicating and learning from law
    enforcement, who is learning from kids in school and friends
    and family. Having that open conversation will only benefit
    them.
        Right now, we see many of the companies ignoring or not
    having that communication with the public and law enforcement.
    Things--they think that they can, in a sense, take it upon
    themselves to learn it, or wait to become reactive.
        So I think, if you are going to build a platform
    environment for kids to operate on, then you need to be
    responsible for taking action and learning what to look for.
        Ms. Craig. Thank you so much. Amen to that. And with that,
    I am sorry I am out of time, but
        [inaudible] topic.
        I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentlelady yields back, and now I
    welcome as a waive-on to our subcommittee Mr. Walden--I am
    sorry, Walberg--for 5 minutes.
        Mr. Walberg. Thank you, Madam Chair, for allowing me to
    waive on to this hearing.
        This is the third legislative hearing the committee has
    held on holding Big Tech accountable. But once again, I believe
    it fails to address one of the most pressing issues: it is
    personal, of course, but the need for a comprehensive national
    privacy and data security framework. Though many of the
    proposals today are admirable, they include components that
    should be considered in a comprehensive framework, not as a
    piecemeal set of bills. Members of the committee need to get
    back to our bipartisan work to create this framework. Privacy,
    and children's privacy in particular, should be a no-brainer.
        Despite what the gentlelady from Florida said earlier,
    there already is a bipartisan COPPA bill in the House. I and my
    good friend, Congressman Rush, introduced the PROTECT Kids Act,
    which would update and modernize COPPA for the online behavior
    and devices of today. The legislation was introduced last
    Congress, and I would be glad to work with her on this issue.
        This is another reason why I am disappointed that the
    majority denied Republicans' second request to include this
    legislation in today's hearing. I am committed to finding a
    bipartisan agreement on COPPA as a part of a larger privacy
    package, and I hope that the majority will work with us to find
    common ground on our proposals.
        Ms. McInnis, my PROTECT Kids Act adds precise geolocation
    and biometric information as two new categories of personal
    information which are protected for children under COPPA. I
    believe that behavioral ads can be beneficial for adults, but
    many of those benefits do not translate when it comes to kids.
    And so how can companies like TikTok design their platforms to
    better protect this type of information for children, without
    the negative effects that a blanket ban on ad targeting would
    have for small business, small and local businesses?
        Ms. McInnis. Thank you for the question, Representative.
        We encourage companies like TikTok to stem the amount of
    data that they are collecting from all users, especially
    children.
        DuckDuckGo is a search engine, and so I can't speak to many
    of the issues preventing social media companies, in particular.
    But we do think that there is more that companies could be
    doing proactively to protect users, and also ways they could be
    adjusting their algorithm to ensure that they are not causing
    the sort of mental health and other relevant harms that we have
    seen Frances Haugen speak about with regards to Facebook that
    we know we are being perpetrated online.
        But regardless, the fact that this company can target users
    and adjust the algorithm in order to kind of reach users in
    this moment of mental health crisis, or kind of anything
    related to that, means that they are collecting too much
    information on us all, much less kids.
        Mr. Walberg. Yes, yes. Thank you for that.
        My legislation also raises the age for parental consent
    protections for children online from 13 to 16 years of age. I
    have lost their votes now, but I think it is responsible, a
    responsible approach to take. I support raising the age of
    COPPA.
        But Mr. Duffey, in your testimony you highlight how
    children and tweens frequently bypass parental consent
    protections in order to socialize online. Can you elaborate on
    the dangers that those between the ages of 13 and 16 face on
    social media sites, and how those dangers may differ from those
    under 13?
        And also, what should Congress be considering to address
    age restrictions online?
        Mr. Duffey. Thank you, Representative. I would offer to the
    committee that, when we talk about 13 to 16 years old, we--in
    talking with mental health professionals, I would offer up
    their thoughts and opinions and medical concerns, because the
    content that you view at the age of 13 versus the content that
    you are viewing at 16 is going to--what we have seen with the
    kids is it is going to greatly impact potential behavior
        [inaudible] forward with as they grow.
        When we talk about the children today circumventing the
    system, it is very much an issue, because I don't know that you
    will ever stop youth from bypassing----
        Mr. Walberg. And parents can be an asset.
        Mr. Duffey. Yes, they very much can, but they need to be
    educated, as well.
        Mr. Walberg. OK, thank you. I see my time has expired.
        And thank you for allowing me to waive on.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Thank you, Mr. Walberg. And now I am happy
    to have the opportunity to waive on to this subcommittee
    Congresswoman Eshoo, who is the author and chief sponsor of the
    Banning Surveillance Advertising bill that we are considering
    today.
        Ms. Eshoo, you are recognized.
        Ms. Eshoo. Well, thank you, Madam Chair, for not only
    holding this hearing, but welcoming me to waive on to the
    subcommittee. I thank you for being with me on the Banning
    Surveillance Advertising Act. If our colleague, Bobby Rush, is
    still with us, I want to thank him, as well.
        First I want to go to Ms. McInnis. Thank you for your
    excellent testimony, and for your support of my legislation.
        To my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, you may not
    know, but my bill does go after the root of the social media
    problem, which is a toxic business model. Critics say that
    there can't be an internet economy without surveillance ads.
    They have really poured it on, you know, that, you know, the
    internet will implode without this.
        But I view it another way. And I think so does DuckDuckGo,
    because it is a counter-example. So I want to respond just
    briefly to a few questions related to the criticism that
    opponents of my bill cite very often. And if you could keep
    your responses brief, I would really appreciate that.
        So to Ms. McInnis, have you found that contextual
    advertising to be less effective than behavioral advertising?
        Ms. McInnis. We have not. We use contextual advertising
    ourselves, not only to fund the business, but also to reach new
    and potential users of the DuckDuckGo services.
        In addition, I have spoken often about the need to invest
    more in the contextual advertising model. Just because the ad
    duopoly from Facebook and Google are asserting to us that
    behavioral ads work better, it is not true that contextual ads
    can't be just as relevant.
        Ms. Eshoo. Do you hear major complaints from users that
    your ads are not relevant enough?
        Ms. McInnis. We syndicate our advertisements from
    Microsoft's Bing.
        We find that users are coming to us primarily for privacy
    protection, and we offer them best-in-class privacy protection,
    relevant results, and quality services, while also protecting
    their privacy.
        We are hopeful that, with a bill like the Banning
    Surveillance Advertising Act of 2022, we will have more
    competition in the contextual ads market, which will not only
    enable more companies to compete against Facebook and Google's
    ad duopoly, but also enable small businesses to go to more
    advertisers, rather than just the two big duopoly--big
    monopolies in town to source their advertisements.
        Ms. Eshoo. Two more questions. Are small businesses able to
    use contextual ads to reach their customers?
        And the other question is will the internet break without
    surveillance ads?
        Maybe you should take that first.
        Ms. McInnis. The internet will not break without
    surveillance ads. And in fact, DuckDuckGo is proof positive
    that you can have a successful and profitable company without
    surveilling users.
        In addition, small businesses can use contextual ads to
    reach their users. And indeed, many do, because contextual ads
    are cheaper, and usually provide users with the same amount of
    revenue in return. We have cited some studies from researchers
    like Alessandro Acquisti, pointing out that behavioral
    advertising does not, in fact, result in much added revenue for
    publishers. And we think that is also true for small
    businesses.
        Ms. Eshoo. Wonderful. Let me go to Ms. Nkonde.
        Thank you for your powerful testimony, and for everything
    that you are doing in this space. Can you State to members and
    whomever is tuned in about the harms that ad targeting have
    caused people, particularly people of color?
        I think that this is--I know what the answer is, but I
    would like to have you put it out on the table, so that people
    have even more clarity about this.
        Ms. Nkonde. So what we found in the election space is our
    adversaries really take advantage of racial divides in this
    country by targeting advertising online toward Black
    communities, and we have heard earlier in this hearing Spanish-
    speaking communities, when they want to divide and weaken us.
        So what your bill actually does is add national security
    protections on top of this, on top of all the other
    protections, because, without that targeting--targeted
    advertising, it breaks down that pathway.
        Ms. Eshoo. Thank you.
        And I yield back, Madam Chair, and thank you for having me
    with you. It is a terrific subcommittee.
        Ms. Schakowsky. The gentlelady yields back. I thank you--
    thank her for her presence with us today.
        I--seeing no more members who have questions, I want to
    sincerely thank our witnesses for your participation today.
    This was really a great hearing. All of you contributed so much
    to the discussions that we need to be having, so I thank you.
        And I want to remind members that, pursuant to committee
    rules, they have 10 business days to submit additional
    questions for the record to be answered by the witnesses who
    have appeared to today.
        And I certainly ask each witness to respond as promptly as
    you can to any of the questions that you may receive.
        With that, before we adjourn, I request unanimous consent
    to enter the following documents into the record: a letter from
    the Association of National Advertisers; a letter from the--
    what is that?
        Voice. Interactive.
        Ms. Schakowsky. Interactive----
        Voice. Advertising.
        Ms. Schakowsky. I will start again. A letter from the
    Interactive Advertising Bureau; a report from New York
    University; a letter from the Software and Information Industry
    Association; a letter from the FTC--a letter to the FTC; a
    letter from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
        And without objection, so ordered.
        [Material submitted for inclusion in the record follows:]
        Ms. Schakowsky. And I want to see if my ranking member had
    anything he wanted to add.
        Mr. Bilirakis. I am good. I appreciate everything you have
    done today, and we hope we can----
        Ms. Schakowsky. Put--yes, go ahead.
        Mr. Bilirakis. No, thank you very much, Madam Chair. I
    appreciate it very much, and I want to thank the witnesses, and
    the panel.
        And also, we want to get these bills moved forward with a
    markup, and get them on the floor as soon as possible,
    particularly when it comes to the social media and what it is
    doing to our children. It is unacceptable. We have to hold
    these companies accountable.
        So thank you for bringing it to our attention today. And
    again, I appreciate it very much, Madam Chair. I yield back.
        Ms. Schakowsky. At this time, the subcommittee is
    adjourned. Thank you.
        [Whereupon, at 1:28 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]