California lawmakers this year will consider a measure that would fine social media companies for using algorithms that influence children to harm themselves or others and that prompt people to buy illegal guns.Democratic State Sen. Nancy Skinner filed the bill, Senate Bill 287, which would fine companies like Meta and TikTok up to $250,000 per violation, plus other costs related to enforcing the law. The bill specifically bans social media companies from using algorithms that could lead children to buy fentanyl, harm themselves or others, die by suicide, or develop an eating disorder. It would also ban algorithms that would lead anyone to buy illegal firearms, including ghost guns. "Social media companies are no longer passive actors in the online marketplace," Skinner said in a statement. "They’re active participants that decide what users see and what they don’t. As a result, they must be held responsible when their algorithms purposely target our children with dangerous or harmful content." The bill is backed by Common Sense Media, which supported a similar measure last year that died in the powerful State Senate Appropriations Committee. Supporters of the bill blamed the chairman of that committee, Democratic State Sen. Anthony Portantino for single-handedly killing the bill after he attended a pricey policy summit with tech groups the week before the committee met to determine which bills would move forward for the year. "As documented over and over, a tiny handful of rich and powerful companies are knowingly and carelessly causing an unprecedented number of our children—just children!—to die by taking their own lives, by fentanyl overdoses, from choking challenges, from addiction, and causing life-altering child anguish on a scale never before seen," said Ed Howard, senior counsel at Children's Advocacy Institute.