The CEO of Twitter admitted that his platform facilitated the attack on Capitol Hill, while that of Facebook took no responsibility.

Two months after the violent attack on the United States Capitol by supporters of then-President Donald Trump, which left five dead, a virtual hearing of the House’s Energy and Commerce subcommittee representatives took place this Thursday on the fight against disinformation in which members of Congress they questioned the leaders of the main platforms and social networks on this subject: Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Jack Dorsey (Twitter) and Sundar Pichai (Google).

In part of the audience, Democratic Representative Mike Doyle (Pa.) Asked businessmen if their platforms helped spread disinformation and plan the attack on Congress. The answer must be “yes” or “no”.

In what appears to have been the first public recognition of a senior executive at these companies, Dorsey responded that “Yes“. However, he clarified: “We also have to take into account a larger ecosystem, it’s not just the technology platforms that we use”.

Instead, Zuckerberg began a more expansive response: “Our responsibility is to build systems…” he said, when Frank Pallone, chairman of the committee, interrupted him and asked him to just say “ Yes or no”. In view of this, the CEO of Facebook has remained silent.

With that in mind, Zuckerberg defended the role his company played in the 2020 US electoral process and in the months that followed. Referring to the attacks on Capitol Hill, he blamed former President Donald Trump.

“We did our job to ensure the integrity of the elections. And then on January 6, President Trump gave a speech in which he rejected the results and called on people to fight back.Zuckerberg said in his appearance.

Pichai, for his pâté, also did not offer a concrete answer: “We still feel a certain sense of responsibility,” he said.

Following the Jan.6 attack on Trump supporters, Twitter and Facebook banned Trump from posting to their platforms, a situation that continues today. Their actions suggested that they saw a risk of further violence being instigated from what was posted on their sites.

Twitter has said the decision is permanent, while a panel of experts outside Facebook continues to deliberate whether to follow the same steps or not.. In view of this, various reports have indicated that Trump is working on launching his own social network.

Faced with questions about the increase in hate, racist, extremist and disinformation messages, CEOs said they were doing everything possible to avoid such harmful content.

“Every day Twitter faces complex considerations of how to counter extremism and disinformation,” Dorsey said in her prior written testimony. And he added: “Our efforts to fight disinformation, however, must be linked to building confidence. Without trust, we know the public will continue to question our actions.“.

Pichai said Google is committed to providing people with “trustworthy content and free expression opportunities through our platforms, while limiting the scope of harmful disinformation.”

Zuckerberg, for his part, noted that Facebook has stepped up its efforts to “prevent hate and violence” from the platform and offered a proposal to address concerns about the liability of networks, suggesting that everyone have systems to eliminate illegal content.

And he concluded: “People of all political stripes want to know that businesses take responsibility for tackling illegal content and activity on their platforms.“

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