Testimony

Written Testimony Before the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Commerce, Hearing on "Holding Big Tech Accountable: Legislation to Build a Safer Internet"

Dec 2021 🇺🇸 U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Commerce

On December 9, 2021, Josh Golin, executive director of Fairplay, testified before a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee hearing on legislation to build a safer internet for children. Testifying weeks after former Facebook employee Frances Haugen's disclosures about Instagram, Golin argued the problems she surfaced were not unique to one company: he described compulsive overuse, exposure to harmful content, cyberbullying, mental-health strain, and child sexual exploitation as industry-wide issues linked to platform design rather than isolated incidents. He urged the subcommittee to advance two specific bills — the Kids Internet Design and Safety (KIDS) Act and a children's and teens' online privacy protection update — arguing that together they would curb manipulative design features and restrict the collection and monetized use of young people's data. TechKids Foundation includes this testimony as a documented instance of advocacy directly tied to pending federal legislation, not as an independent research finding.

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CITATION

Golin, Josh. Written Testimony of Josh Golin, Executive Director, Fairplay, Before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Commerce, Hearing on "Holding Big Tech Accountable: Legislation to Build a Safer Internet." December 9, 2021. https://docs.house.gov/meetings/IF/IF17/20211209/114299/HHRG-117-IF17-Wstate-GolinJ-20211209.pdf

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