Congress is investigating the harm that the app imposes on kids

Following weeks of scrutiny… Instagram’s chief executive will be testifying before Congress for the first time in early December.

The chair of the Senate Commerce subcommittee on consumer protection says the “bombshell reports about Instagram’s toxic impacts” has left them wanting to “hear straight from the company’s leadership”.

The report found that Instagram made one third of teenage girls feel worse about their bodies, and about 13% of teenage British users who experienced suicidal thoughts could trace the issue back to the app.

The subcommittee is concerned about “Why the platform uses powerful algorithms that push poisonous content to children driving them down rabbit holes to dark places, and what it will do to make its platform safer”.

They hope that the chief will “support specific legislative reforms and solutions, particularly in its immensely potent algorithms”.

This comes only weeks after former Facebook employee Frances Haugen released thousands of pages of internal documents exposing Instagram’s parent company Facebook to the Senate.