The Big Story · Frequency Podcast Network

Is it time for Canada to toughen up its social media laws for youth?

April 6, 2026·24 min·2 clips

Arturo Bejar's 14-year-old daughter received unwanted nudes and sexual advances on Instagram, exposing Meta's safety gaps.

Host Karen Sciolin interviews Arturo Bejar, a former Meta security expert turned whistleblower. Bejar first worked at Meta from 2009 to 2015, overseeing safety and child security. He returned in 2019 after his 14-year-old daughter faced unwanted nudes, sexual advances, and bullying on Instagram. During his second stint, he found Instagram's Wellbeing Team lacked basic guardrails, with no way for teens to report unwanted sexual advances. Bejar conducted a global survey revealing staggering rates of harm among teens, which he reported to Mark Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg did not reply, a response Bejar interprets as avoiding a record of engagement. Bejar attributes safety neglect to Meta's competitive culture and resource allocation, noting only about 20 engineers worked on teen mental health issues versus 30,000 total engineers. He testified in two landmark trials: one in Santa Fe where Meta was found guilty of knowingly putting kids in contact with predators, and another in Los Angeles where Meta and YouTube were found liable for addictive product designs. Bejar explains addictive features like infinite scroll, algorithmic recommendations based on attention metrics, autoplay videos, and social pressure metrics. He argues these designs extract time and attention for ad revenue without benefiting users. Bejar believes regulation or litigation is necessary to compel changes, such as time limits or default connections only to known people. Currently, he says the onus is on parents to educate themselves and support their children, using a car safety metaphor to emphasize platform responsibility. The episode concludes with Bejar advocating for collective action to improve social media safety for youth.

As heard by us

A sober look at who is responsible when social platforms put kids at risk.

The Big Story opens on a Los Angeles verdict that finds Meta and YouTube liable for intentionally designing addictive products, and it uses that ruling to widen into a clear discussion of what platforms owe young users.

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Why you'd press play

If Meta's duty to kids matters to you, this keeps the argument grounded.

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