WASHINGTON — Lawmakers of both parties have come out swinging in a hearing on Wednesday with Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, expressing deep skepticism and anger toward the company for not doing enough to protect young users.
In a hearing in the Senate consumer protection subcommittee, lawmakers are grilling Mr. Mosseri on internal research leaked by a whistle-blower that showed Instagram had a toxic effect on some teenagers. They are pressing him to commit to share data with researchers on algorithmic ranking systems and to support legislation for stronger privacy and security protections of children online.
Even Instagram’s announcements this week on new safety tools for children were too little and too late, they said.
“Facebook’s own researchers have been warning management, including yourself, Mr. Mosseri, for years,” Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut and chair of the subcommittee. “Parents are asking, what is Congress doing to protect our kids and the resounding bipartisan message from this committee is that legislation is coming. We can’t rely on self-policing.”
It is Mr. Mosseri’s first appearance before Congress. He is the highest-ranking official from Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook and the parent company of Instagram, to testify to lawmakers after a whistle-blower leaked internal research that said Instagram led one out of three teenagers to feel worse about their body image and for as many as 16 percent of some teens in Britain to have thoughts of suicide.
The documents obtained by the whistle-blower in many cases contradicted the public statements of Meta officials, who have long underplayed or refuted criticism that Instagram harms the mental and emotional well-being of younger users.
“You better tell the truth. You’re under oath,” said Senator Amy Klobuchar, the Democrat of Minnesota.
Mr. Mosseri said Instagram has a positive role in the lives of teenagers, such as by helping them establish connections during difficult times. He also recognized the skepticism among members of Congress toward Meta.
“I recognize that many in this room have deep reservations about our company,” Mr. Mosseri said, “but I want to assure you that we do have the same goal. We all want teens to be safe online.”
On Tuesday, Instagram announced new safety features for children. Mr. Mosseri noted those changes, which include tools like a “take a break” feature that is meant to help limit time spent online. (TikTok has a similar function that appears when users are spending too much time on the app.)
But even the basic promises of privacy and security have failed users, said Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, the ranking Republican member of the subcommittee. This week, her staff set up an experimental account for a fictional 15-year-old and were surprised to find the profile automatically set to public exposure. Instagram says teenage accounts automatically default to the private setting.
Mr. Mosseri acknowledged the error and said Ms. Blackburn’s office exposed a flaw in their controls that sets teenage accounts that were created on a web browser — and not on a mobile app — to public. “We will correct that,” Mr. Mosseri said.
Mr. Mosseri, 38, is a longtime executive at Facebook and considered a close lieutenant of the company’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg. He joined the company in 2008 as a designer and gradually rose in the ranks to run the News Feed, a central feature of the Facebook app.
In October 2018, he was named head of Instagram, weeks after the sudden resignations of the app’s founders, Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger.
This is the fifth hearing by the Senate consumer protection subcommittee on protecting children online, and executives of TikTok and YouTube have already appeared. But Instagram became the focus of lawmakers after a former Facebook employee, Frances Haugen, leaked internal research that showed some troubling findings about the toxic role Instagram plays in the lives of young users, particularly teenage girls.
Mr. Blumenthal has said his office had received hundreds of calls and emails from parents about their negative experiences with Instagram. One parent recounted how her daughter’s interest in fitness on Instagram led the app to recommend accounts on extreme dieting, eating disorders and self-harm.
Mr. Blumenthal has homed in on the algorithms that push such recommendations.
Lawmakers, including Mr. Blumenthal and Ms. Blackburn, have proposed stronger data privacy rules aimed at protecting children, greater enforcement of age restrictions and the ability of young users to delete information online.
Senator John Thune, a Republican of South Dakota, has introduced a bill that would force companies to reveal more about their algorithmic ranking system. He asked if Instagram would allow users to rank their content chronologically, instead of through opaque decisions based purely on engagement. Mr. Mosseri said the company was working on the feature, which could be available next year.
