Coco loved being the life of the party 鈥� cracking jokes, doing pranks and making people laugh, her mom, Julianna Arnold, recalled recently.
鈥淗er favorite pastime was fashion,鈥� Arnold said. 鈥淪he didn鈥檛 like looking at magazines or going to fancy stores, but preferred to make her own creations from used clothing she would find at thrift stores.... And they always looked fabulous on her.鈥�
In 2022, two weeks after she turned 17, Coco left home just outside New York City to meet with a dealer she'd messaged through Instagram who promised to sell her Percocet. She never made it home. She was found dead the next day, two blocks from the address that the guy had provided her.
Whatever the dealer gave Coco, her mother said, was not Percocet. It was a fake pill laced with fentanyl, which can be lethal in a dose as small as the tip of a pencil.
Fentanyl overdoses have become for minors in the last five years or so, even as overall drug use has dropped slightly. In a 2022 analysis of fentanyl-laced prescription pills, the contained a potentially lethal dose of the drug.
And social media, where tainted, fake prescription drugs can be obtained with just a few clicks, is a big part of the problem. Experts, law enforcement and children鈥檚 advocates say companies like Snap, TikTok, Telegram and Meta Platforms, which owns Instagram, are not doing enough to .
A few taps away
The stories of these victims often play out similarly: The kids hear you can get pills on social media. A few taps later and then a package arrives. They retreat to the sanctity of their bedroom and take a pill. Fifteen minutes later, they鈥檙e dead. No one even knows until the next morning.
Paul DelPonte, executive director and CEO of the National Crime Prevention Council, likened this crisis to a Johnson & Johnson incident in 1982 when seven people died due to that had been tampered with. In that case, J&J recalled all bottles and stopped production until they discovered the source of the problem.
鈥淎s a result, we now have tamper-resistant caps on over-the-counter medicines and in other products. That鈥檚 corporate responsibility,鈥� he said. 鈥淔or years, social media companies have known this has been happening, yet they continue to operate their platforms without any significant changes.鈥�
While data on the prevalence of drug sales on social platforms is hard to come by, the National Crime Prevention Council estimates 80% of teen and young adult fentanyl poisoning deaths can be traced to some social media contact.
In a on the problem, Colorado's attorney general called the availability of fentanyl and other illicit substances online 鈥渟taggering.鈥�
鈥淒ue to their ubiquity, convenience, and lack of regulation, social media platforms have become a major venue for drug distribution,鈥� the report said. 鈥淲here once a teen might have had to seek out a street dealer, hassle friends, or learn to navigate the dark web to access illicit drugs, young people can now locate drug dealers using their smartphones 鈥� with the relative ease of ordering food delivery or calling a ride-share service.鈥�
Accidental overdoses in the U.S. have decreased slightly each year since 2021 according to the . DelPonte attributes this in part to more education and awareness about the issue. Among young people ages 0 to 19, there were 1,622 overdose deaths in 2021, then 1,590 in 2022, and 1,511 last year.
The decline, DelPonte said, is 鈥渧ery small.鈥�
A decade ago, people looking to buy illicit drugs online would visit the dark web. But this was quickly eclipsed by social media and messaging platforms鈥� rise. Using popular social media sites, encrypted chats, legitimate payment and shipping services, dealers moved into the light. Social platforms say they are constantly working to address the issue, while law enforcement has made some inroads.
Last May, for instance, the Drug Enforcement Administration鈥檚 鈥淥peration Last Mile,鈥� targeting Mexico鈥檚 Sinaloa and Jalisco Cartels, led to 3,337 arrests and the seizure of nearly 44 million fentanyl pills and other deadly drugs. More than 1,100 associated cases involved social media apps and encrypted communications platforms, the DEA said.
On Instagram, as recently as this summer, a simple hashtag search for popular prescription drugs brought up numerous results with accounts offering to sell illicit pills to anyone looking. Many accounts directed users to Snapchat or Telegram, where experts say encryption and alleged lax moderation make it even easier to engage in illegal activity. Money is sent through payment platforms and the drugs can be delivered by mail, DelPonte said.
Meta, for its part, has made it more difficult to search for drugs on its platform in recent weeks.
鈥楴ever in a million years鈥�
Mikayla Brown lost her son Elijah, who went by Eli, to a suspected fentanyl overdose in 2023, two weeks after his 15th birthday. Eli loved skateboarding, video games and cooking. His favorite was spicy Cajun pasta his mom made and he just started to get into cooking himself.
Eli began experimenting with marijuana in high school and he was going through what seemed like a phase many teenagers go through, his mom said. The family decided he鈥檇 go live with his biological father about three hours away in Woodland Hills in Los Angeles, to try to get a handle on what Brown called Eli鈥檚 鈥渞ebellion era.鈥�
Brown said the family 鈥渘ever in a million years鈥� would have thought he was getting into anything more dangerous than that. There was one exception, about a year before he passed away, his mom found him acting funny and he admitted to having taken Xanax, a prescription anti-anxiety drug.
On a September evening last year, Eli arrived home from a friend鈥檚 house, had dinner with his dad and stayed up late to watch a movie.
His father sent him to bed around "2 a.m., I guess,鈥� Brown said. 鈥淎nd then when his alarm went off in the morning to wake up Eli for school he found him in his room...鈥�
Eli was unresponsive. His cause of death was accidental fentanyl overdose. But he wasn鈥檛 trying to buy fentanyl, he was looking for Xanax, and, like Coco, ended up with tainted pills that killed him.
Until recently, a search for #Xanax on Instagram led to a warning page specifying that 鈥淭his may be associated with the sale of drugs鈥� and that the 鈥渟ale, purchase of trade of illicit drugs can cause harm to yourself and others and is illegal in most countries.鈥� A blue 鈥淕et help鈥� link directed users to federal . Underneath that link, users could click to 鈥渟ee results anyway.鈥� After it was pointed out by the AP, the company quickly removed the ability to 鈥渟ee results anyway鈥� for location-specific hashtags such as #xanaxdallas or #xanaxchicago. Later, it also removed the 鈥渟ee results鈥� option entirely for common drugs such as Xanax, cocaine and Adderall, among others.
Meta also said it investigated accounts shared by The Associated Press and concluded they were not drug dealers, but financial scam artists based in Africa pretending to sell drugs locally.
Meta says it blocks and filters 鈥渉undreds鈥� of terms associated with illicit drug sales and links to recovery and substance abuse resources when possible. But drug dealers and other bad actors constantly shift their strategies, coming up with fresh ways to avoid detection.
David Decary-Hetu, a professor at the School of Criminology at the University of Montreal, said Meta, in particular, has been 鈥渜uite effective鈥� in targeting people who sell drugs on its social platforms. But, he added, 鈥渋t doesn鈥檛 mean it鈥檚 not going to happen.鈥�
In a statement, Meta said drug dealers 鈥渁re criminals who stop at nothing to sell their dangerous products. This is a challenge that spans across platforms, industries, and communities, and it requires all of us working together to address it.鈥�
The company added that it works with law enforcement and proactively took down 2 million pieces of content, 99.7% before they were reported in the .
鈥淥ur hearts go out to the families suffering at the hands of these criminals and we are committed to working with others to prevent these tragedies,鈥� Meta added.
A persistent problem
Coco鈥檚 mother had many discussions with her daughter about being careful online.
The teen was in therapy 鈥� social media really affected her and she developed anxiety and depression, Arnold said. She frequently checked Coco's social media and limited her time on Snapchat to 15 minutes per day.
鈥淪he knew about a lot of this stuff. We had talked about it. But then when this came up on Instagram, you know, I wasn鈥檛 checking and I couldn鈥檛 check all of her direct messages. It鈥檚 hard to know as a parent, no matter how on top of it you are,鈥� she said.
Coco鈥檚 death is still under investigation, Arnold said.
Arnold said it took five months to remove the dealer鈥檚 profile from Instagram. Occasionally, she checks to see if he鈥檚 there under another name.
鈥淚 typed in something that I thought maybe could work, you know, based on what his previous handle had been. And there he was. He was back up under a different a different handle,鈥� she said. 鈥淏ut I recognized his photo and I reported it to the police. And now again, it鈥檚 taking months to get it taken down.鈥�
Experts often single out Snapchat as a particularly dangerous platform, something the company vehemently disagrees with. In October 2022, a group of parents who say their children bought fentanyl from drug dealers they met through Snapchat sued the company for wrongful death and negligence, calling it a 鈥渉aven for drug trafficking.鈥�
鈥淒espite Snap promoting and portraying Snapchat as a 鈥榞oofy鈥� app for kids to use to send each other silly pictures, its known common use is as an 鈥榦pen-air drug market,鈥欌�� the lawsuit claims. Snapchat鈥檚 role in illicit drug sales to teens, it continues, 鈥渨as the foreseeable result of the designs, structures, and policies Snap chose to implement to increase its revenues.鈥�
The vast majority of fentanyl deaths among young people, the lawsuit says, involve kids who don鈥檛 know they are ingesting fentanyl. Rather, they are buying what they believe is marijuana, MDMA or prescription drugs like OxyContin. In January, a judge ruled that .
It鈥檒l be yet another test for , a 1996 law that generally exempts internet companies from liability for material users post on their networks.
In a statement, Snap said it is 鈥渉eartbroken by the fentanyl epidemic and are deeply committed to the fight against it.鈥�
鈥淲e鈥檝e invested in advanced technology to detect and remove illicit drug-related content, work extensively with law enforcement helping to bring dealers to justice, and continue to raise awareness and evolve our service to help keep our community safe. Criminals have no place on Snapchat,鈥� said Jacqueline Beauchere, Global Head of Platform Safety at the company.
While Snap wouldn鈥檛 comment on the lawsuit itself, the company argues its design actually makes it more difficult for bad actors to operate. For instance, the company says, it doesn鈥檛 allow people to get messages from people they haven鈥檛 added as friends or have a phone contact, and location sharing is off by default.
Regulatory remedies?
Advocates are hoping that regulation of tech companies could help address the problem, as it might help with other dangers kids face on social media. In July, the Senate , legislation . It still awaits a vote in the House. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., and Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., meanwhile, introduced a bill that would require social media companies to report illicit fentanyl, methamphetamine and fake pill activity occurring on their platforms to law enforcement.
鈥淲e must do more at the federal level to combat the flow of fentanyl into our communities, and it starts by holding social media companies accountable for their part in facilitating illicit drug sales,鈥� Shaheen said.
But for parents like Arnold, Brown and others who already lost their children to overdoses, it is too late.
鈥淪ocial media companies have the ability to make their platforms drug-free zones,鈥� DelPonte said. 鈥淚nstead, they keep evading the meaningful changes to keep the public safe.鈥�
Barbara Ortutay, The Associated Press
