Content warning: Rape, drug misuse, death.

Dear Friend,

I was in the room last week when Mark Zuckerberg turned to our group of parents to apologize during a Senate hearing on social media and the online child sexual exploitation crisis. Neither his apology nor the testimony of other tech leaders in the room will bring back my daughter, Becca, who was just 18 when she died—after a series of tragedies enabled by social media platforms changed the trajectory of her life.

Sign the petition demanding Big Tech stop putting profits above our kids’ lives.

Becca was 15 when she was raped by someone she met through an online party chat. Soon after the rape, she was revictimized in a cruel and humiliating cyberbullying incident. Eventually Becca turned to drugs to fill the emptiness these traumas left inside her. Despite our family’s love and support, and the professional help Becca received, we could not compete with the easy access social media gave her to drugs that numbed her pain. Even moving Becca away from her local drug dealer connections did not help because, no matter where she was, she could find illicit drugs close by online.

Becca died at the age of 18 from fentanyl poisoning. The drugs she purchased online that day, unknown to her, had been laced with the deadly synthetic opioid, and we lost her. Three years later, illicit drugs remain prevalent on social media platforms, and purchasing them is still as frictionless as ordering an Uber.

Most people do not fully understand that, for all the positives the internet has brought in the form of information-sharing and connection to distant family and friends, allowing social media to pervade our kids’ lives as it has, with no federal oversight, is not only alarming but has led to the type of painful consequences that my family and far too many others have experienced. There is a generation of children who have become the collateral damage to the tech industry’s greed and Congress’ inaction.

Sign the petition.

The publicness and permanence of online bullying makes it a particularly humiliating and harmful act of cruelty, and there is virtually no accountability to the government or to the parents who bury their children.

Since my daughter’s death, I have met too many parents who have lost children to dangerous online challenges, like the “choking game” (self-strangulation in order to achieve a brief high, which is shared widely online); counterfeit pills laced with deadly fentanyl purchased via social media; or suicide after being mercilessly cyberbullied. Countless other children have been, and are being, exposed to harmful content by algorithms designed to maximize users’ time on platforms. These algorithms pull youth down rabbit holes of toxic content to keep them online as long as possible. The longer users stay on, the more ad profits go to the tech companies.

Sign the petition telling Meta and other social media giants to prioritize safety for children, protect students from overuse and addictive-like behavior, protect students’ privacy, protect students from risky algorithms, and directly engage and work with schools and families.

Becca was a beautiful and caring person with a gift for making those around her feel loved and appreciated. Her smile could light up a room. Her passion for life and vibrant spirit were hallmarks of her personality. She was adventurous, curious and willful. She was a sensitive soul who, like other young souls lost to social media harms, did not deserve to experience so much pain in her short life.

Every day, we need to remember her smile, her happiness and the pure joy she brought to all our lives. And every day we need to fight for solutions that will prevent similar tragedies from happening to other children and their families. That’s why the Becca Schmill Foundation is working with the AFT and ParentsTogether to promote real solutions to help kids and communities thrive, and I hope you will sign the petition to help us save lives.

Thank you,
Deb Schmill
Becca Schmill Foundation