U.S. senators slammed the CEOs of five major social media companies as they testified before Congress Wednesday about their efforts to combat child sexual abuse material. Here’s what you need to know:

The context: Sexually explicit content featuring children is more widely available online than ever. Reports of child sexual abuse material on online platforms reached a record high of more than 36 million in 2023 in the U.S., up from 32 million in 2022, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Smartphones and private messaging apps have increased the opportunities available to predators.

The hearing comes as U.S. elected officials consider a bundle of online safety bills, including one that would make it easier for child sexual abuse victims to sue platforms that host exploitative content. Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, TikTok’s Shou Zi Chew, X’s Linda Yaccarino, Snap’s Evan Spiegel and Discord’s Jason Citron all testified, after a senate panel issued a subpoena to compel the latter three CEOs to attend.

Hours before the hearing, U.S. lawmakers released internal emails from Meta, which showed the Facebook and Instagram owner rejected proposals to increase resources to improve child safety. Zuckerberg countered by highlighting the company employs 40,000 security and safety workers and has spent US$20 billion on the issue since 2016.

The testimony: The hearing opened with video statements from survivors of online child abuse and their families. Parents showed photos of children who died from suicide after being exploited on social media platforms. “How many more kids will suffer and die because of social media?” one asked.

In one emotional moment, Zuckerberg turned around and apologized to families of victims attending the hearing, at the urging of Sen. Josh Hawley. “I’m sorry for everything you’ve all been through. It’s terrible. No one should have to go through the things that your families have suffered,” he said to applause.

Sen. Lindsey Graham also elicited applause, saying to Zuckerberg and the other tech CEOs at the hearing, “you have blood on your hands.” 

“You have a product that’s killing people. We had cigarettes killing people. We did something about it,” he said.

What’s next: Tech CEOs are under pressure to endorse the proposed online child safety bills. Yaccarino, X’s CEO, drew praise for being the first to back the Stop CSAM Act in her opening statement, while Sen. Chris Coons criticized the “yawning silence” from the executives after he asked if they would support a bill called the Platform Accountability and Transparency Act. “After this hearing today, we’re going to put a lot of pressure on our colleagues… to let these bills get to the floor and vote,” Graham said.

Meanwhile, in Canada, Parliament is currently considering Bill C-27, the Liberal government’s legislation on privacy and AI. The proposed law would treat minors’ information as sensitive information, giving it higher standards for protection. It would also offer minors the right to ask companies to delete their data, sometimes known as the right to be forgotten.