Red States Are Taking the Lead to Protect Teens from Big Tech

Toney and Brandy Roberts, the parents of Englyn Roberts, thought they had done everything right when they gave their teenage daughter a smartphone. They told her not to download social-media apps like Instagram and TikTok. They required her to share her password and checked her phone regularly for apps or other questionable content.

But Englyn was able to outsmart them, accessing Instagram and TikTok without their knowledge. And in the midst of some boy troubles, her use of social media helped lead her down a very dark path. A friend shared an Instagram video on suicide, Englyn’s father Toney told 60 Minutes. “And that video was a lady on Instagram pretending to hang herself, and that’s ultimately what our child did. You ask yourself, how did she come up with this idea? And then when I did the research, there it was. She saw it on Instagram.”