Executive Meta to testify to Molly Russell’s inquiry

An executive from Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, will give evidence at the inquest into Molly Russell’s death on Friday.

Elizabeth Lagone, head of health and wellbeing at Meta, is due to appear at Barnet Coroner’s Court, where the inquest is being held into the death of the 14-year-old schoolgirl from Harrow, who took her own life in November 2017.

The teenager had seen an extensive amount of material on social media, including some related to anxiety, depression, self-harm and suicide, before her death.

Her inquest will look at how the algorithms used by the social media giants to keep users engaged may have contributed to her death.

Her death has prompted a campaign for safer online content and pressure is mounting on tech giants to share more data about the impact of their content with researchers and civil society so it can be properly scrutinized.

An open letter from a group of charities has called on the government to amend the Online Safety Act to force more data sharing by tech firms.

A lawyer representing Molly’s family accused Meta of using “totally false and fabricated” arguments to withhold data from an inquest into her death.

Senior Coroner Andrew Walker ordered the company to release data for accounts that are now set to private, even if they come in redacted form.

Meta has also been ordered to disclose documents and data relating to research it has carried out into the harm that could be caused to children by using its platforms.

Lawyers for her family said they requested data about the content that was promoted to Molly by algorithms, but Meta’s lawyer, Samuel Jacobs, told the court that the company did not withhold.

The same, he said, applies to content Molly saw but didn’t engage with.

On Thursday, the inquiry heard an apology from a chief executive of social media giant Pinterest.

The company’s head of community operations, Judson Hoffman, told North London Coroner’s Court that self-harm or suicide content that breaches its policies “probably still exists on our platform” and admitted it is not as safe as it could be.

Mr Hoffman said he “deeply regrets” the posts Molly viewed on Pinterest before her death, saying it was material he “would not show my children”.

He was taken through emails sent to Molly, such as “10 Depressing Pins You Might Like”, which the witness said contained “the kind of content we wouldn’t want anyone to spend a lot of time with time”.

Giving evidence in the witness box on Wednesday, Molly’s father Ian Russell said of the material the teenager engaged in: “It’s just the bleakest of worlds. It’s not a world I recognize.

“It’s a ghetto of the online world.”