to the fighting. the hostage deal, as i understand it, would do those things. it would have a pause in the fighting, a flow of humanitarian aid to prevent starvation in a real humanitarian catastrophe we are seeing unfold in gaza and bring those folks home and return them to their families. i am pushing this very hard. we have to make sure it happens but prime minister continues to derail this issue. he says he's not going to abide by very central elements of the deal. he really needs to step up and do the right thing here. >> we are out of time but real quick, we do think it is close? >> the hostage deal? >> i think it could be close if the right people stand up and do the right thing. if prime minister has to come to the table and he has not done so yet. >> congressman jason crow, joining us on a busy day, appreciate your time. >> thank you for joining inside politics. cnn news central starts right now.

a dire warning. christopher wray sounding the alarm about chinese hackers and the threat posed to american infrastructure. his call to action as he testifies for congress. plus, in the hot seat, major tech ceos face-off with major lawmakers on capitol hill to explain what their platforms are doing or not doing to keep kids safe. critics say it simply is not enough. were going to break down what is at stake for families and how the tech leaders have been responding. a gruesome discovery. a man has been arrested after allegedly beheading his own father, posting video of the severed head on the internet. the disturbing new details we are learning as we follow the leader developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to "cnn news central."

a right now, a high-stakes hearing on capitol hill as lawmakers are grilling the leaders of the world's biggest tech companies about the risks that their platforms opposed to you young people. ceos from meta, instagram, to talk, x, and discord all testifying before the committee asked them family members of kids who died after engaging on social media look on. some of them holding signs with pictures of their loved ones in earlier, the committee's top public and, lindsey graham, told the tech executives point blank that they have on their hands. listen to this. >> mr. zuckerberg, you and the companies before us, i know you do not mean for it to be so, but you have blood on your hands. you have a product that is killing people. >> cnn's claire duffy has been closely watching this hearing.

really, some moments that stand out including what we are showing or what we are going to show in a moment, mark zuckerberg standing up and directly apologizing to these family members. >> right, it has been a really fiery hearing so far but i think that moment where mark zuckerberg turned around, addressed these families in the rooms, many in the room, many of them are holding pictures of their children who have been harmed by social media in some way. that, to me, has been the most striking moment. was and what he said. >> there is families of victims here today. have you apologized to the victims? >> would like to do so now? they are here, you are on national television. would you like to apologize to the victims who have been harmed by your product? >> show him the pictures. would you like to apologize for what you have done to these good people? the things that your families have suffered and this is why we invest so much and are going

to continue these efforts to make sure no one has to go through things your family has to suffer. >> no one should have to go through the types of things that your families have gone through. that moment from mark zuckerberg, really striking and really shows how much pressure these tech ceos are under in this hearing. another thing that stands out to me from this hearing today as all of these different legislative proposals that these lawmakers are trying to gain some momentum behind. you have them asking these tech ceos to endorse things like the kids online safety act, child sexual little material act. these companies are under pressure and lawmakers are under pressure to do more than just talk, boris. >> claire duffy, please stand by. we want to take you to this hearing life. zuckerberg is engaging one-on- one with senator kennedy. let's listen in. >> the user agreements still

suck. >> am not trying to answer that, senator. >> can you still have where nobody can find? >> senator, i'm not quite sure what you are referring to. i think people get the basic view of using the services. it is a free service. you are using it to connect with the people you care about. if you share something with people, other people will be able to see your information. if you are putting something up there to be shared publicly, you are inherently putting it out there. i think people get the basic part. >> mr. zuckerberg, you are in the foothills of creepy. you track people who are not even facebook users. you track your own people, your own users who are your product, even when they are not on facebook. >> going to land this pretty quickly, mr. chairman. it is creepy.

i understand you make a lot of money doing it but i just wonder if our technology is greater than our humanity. let me ask you this final question. instagram is harmful to young people, isn't it? >> senator, i disagree with that. that is not with the research shows on balance. that does not mean that individual people don't have issues and that there are not things that we need to do to help provide the right tools for people but across all the research that we have done internally, the survey that the senator previously cited, there are 12 or 15 different categories of harm that we asked teens if they felt worse or better. across all of them him except the one that senator cited, more people said that using

instagram -- >> we just have to agree to disagree. if you believe that instagram, i'm not saying it is intentional but if you agree with instagram, if you think that instagram is not hurting millions of our young people, particularly young teens, young women, you should not be driving. >> another exchange between senator john kennedy of louisiana and mark zuckerberg. zuckerberg denying that research in that social media is harmful to young people. senator kennedy essentially saying he did not believe that was the case. let's discuss what we've seen play out today with child safety advocate and the ceo of common sense media. great to see you. i think you were watching some

of that testimony alongside. i saw you shaking your head some point. i want to get to that specific point that the senator was trying to make. on a different point earlier today during his testimony, he said, quote, the existing body of scientific work has not shown a causal link between using social media and young people having worse mental health outcomes. is that the case? there are studies that show correlation. maybe not a causation but a correlation, right? >> that is exactly right and that is exactly the point here. this is just mumbo-jumbo from mark zuckerberg who knows better. i run this organization. we wrote a book 10 years ago called talking to facebook about these issues. mark zuckerberg is not about

the problems on facebook and instagram and the deep arms that happen to children for more than a decade. he is parsing his words and some are pathetic. i will say this. the senators who are doing a good job today, where have they been for the last decade? they have not passed a single law to rein in facebook, instagram, or any of the other platforms. they actually have a lot of responsibility for their failure to act. that is why we passed all the laws in california because congress has not done its job. mark zuckerberg's answers are as incredible and non-accurate as you suggest that they are. >> i want to dig into the point you just made about congressional inaction because senator amy, at one point, addressed these ceos directly and said that the reason that congress has not acted in 28 years since the internet has existed in popular mainstream passion is because of the power

that they have. what kind of power is she talking about ? walk us through that. >> is a great question. she is completely correct. by the way, just think about it. 28 years since congress passed a law regulating social media. mark zuckerberg was in kindergarten. they have done nothing. amy is correct about that. the truth is, these are the largest, most powerful companies in the history of the united states, if not the world. the richest companies. they spend hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars annually, lobbying senators, congresspeople, et cetera. at the state level. we are the biggest, come on. we do not compete with the monetarily but we have truth, justice, and the right side of history on our side. the truth is, they've spent so much money lobbying these

issues and congress, for various reasons, has a lot of responsibility for failing to act. it is one thing to have a hearing today. it is one thing to hear talk tough but pass some laws. that is what the people in the audience, the parents whose children have been harmed and are no longer with us, want. they want action and to some extent, it is a circus going on because mark zuckerberg sounds like the tobacco executives from 20 years ago. congress has not regulated these folks. everybody in that room bears responsibility to parents like us. >> it strikes me that you talk about the comparison between what we are watching unfold now and the way the tobacco industry in the early 90s was sued because they had an awareness that nicotine had addictive properties and they had an awareness that smoking had serious health

repercussions. if congress were to act and make these companies potentially liable for causing harm, it would be really difficult to prove that something like social media caused a mental health issue. couldn't other factors be at play? >> sure. we write much of that legislation. we believe that the legal liability factor is here. the tech companies particularly pace have spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to block the legal liability and section 230 which was passed in the 1990s, by the way. which provides a fair amount of immunity to the social media platform. the truth is, they need to be helpfully reliable. senator lindsey graham was absolutely accurate when he said unless you guys are responsible, you will not do

anything. that is true. they will make of these carefully nuanced statements like you heard from mark zuckerberg in a couple of the other people. not causing the harm. in a court of law, those guys would be paying hundreds of millions of dollars per case. that is why they been sued, by the way. facebook and instagram also known as meta-sued by state attorney generals. >> there time is coming. going to be held responsible. congress is responsible for not having acting. their moment is coming now and they are going to be held liable. the court those cases once the loss there will end up in court. >> given with the liability found in the early 90s meant for the tobacco industry, some astronomical sums, i imagine, the economic ramifications of that kind of liability for social media companies. we might see some of them.

great get your perspective on this here. we do want to dip out into the hearing now. >> this is the right direct thing that i'm asking about. >> any specific one of those. i think that the ability to filter and edit images is a useful tool for expression. >> i made no reference to court documents that revealed your knowledge of the impact of these types of filters on young people, generally young girls in particular. >> with court documents -- >> i have not seen any

documents. >> mr. zuckerberg, my time is up. i hope that you hear what is being offered to you and are prepared to step up and do better. i know the senate committee is going to do our work to hold you to greater account. thank you mr. chair. >> we are going to step away from the hearing on capitol hill right now with these tech ceos. we will, of course, keep monitoring this and bring you the highlights as we get them. >> fbi director christopher wray adding his most direct public warning yet. the chinese government hackers are busy figuring out how to have the power to cause mass chaos inside the united states. >> prc hackers are targeting out critical infrastructure. our water treatment plants, our electrical grid, our oil and natural gas pipelines, our transportation systems, and the risk it poses to every american that requires our attention.

now, china's hackers are positioning on american infrastructure in operation to wreak havoc and cause real- world harm to american citizens and immunities if and when china decides the time has come to strike. >> ray is on capitol hill as well. he is there with several other u.s. security experts detailing how serious and pernicious this threat is and why it is time for the united states to tart start dedicating resources to this new national security threat. joining us to talk about this, we have don miller, our law enforcement and intelligence analyst. of course the fbi has been talking about these threats before. would you here today that stood out to you? >> i think what they're doing is doubling down by exposing more information. >> what christopher weight ray was talking about was literally a diabolical plot on the part of the people's republic of china to slowly and quietly

infiltrate the control systems for critical infrastructure across the country so that at the time and place of their choosing, whether it was a military action or for some other reason, they could cause a meltdown in systems like energy, food supply, and everything else. this is something that the government code-named both typhoon. the way it works is to infiltrate the routers that are either chinese made and have built in backdoors or are older and less secure. one at a time across multiple agencies so they can get in there and get administrative rights and be able to override the systems. >> generally jennifer easterly, the director of america's cyber defense agency painted a really vivid picture of these threats. she first talked about the regional mess that happened when the colonial pipeline was

hacked back in 2021. the lesson of this. >> imagine that on a massive scale. imagine not one pipeline but many pipelines disrupted. telecommunications going down so people cannot use their cell phone. people start getting sick from polluted water. trains get derailed. air traffic control system, control systems are malfunctioning. this is truly an everything everywhere all at once scenario and it is one where the chinese government believes that it will likely crush american will for the u.s. to defend taiwan. >> that is an apocalyptic picture you were talking about that is being painted here. >> right. this goes back to when i was in the fbi. this goes back to when i was in the office of the director of national intelligence. we knew that there were hundreds of people from the

chinese military and intelligence services working out of a large building on the outskirts of beijing. it was called unit 61486 of the people's liberation army. there full-time job was hacking. this was not for full-time. this was presented to get into these systems to wreak havoc. what has jenny shirley and her team done? christopher wray and her team are doing the investigation. msa is uncovering a lot of this. one of the reasons that they are telling us all the scary stuff is section 702. the tool they used two collect intelligence on these foreign entities is about to expire and there is resistance in congress to renewing it. they are trying to underline the importance of that and what is on the line. >> we will have to see if that

registers with congress. john, thank you so much. it really was eye-opening listening to this hearing today. >> nude of elements surrounding the special prosecutor involved in georgia's election interference case. why he no longer needs to testify about an alleged improper relationship with the district attorney. taking action with a border deal all the gone, democrats are preparing to fight back to secure the border. we will have that new reporting, i had.

one of donald trump's co- defendants is suing the fulton county district attorney's office, accusing prosecutors withholding information. trump campaign official mike roman is charged with racketeering and conspiracy along with the former president in efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss there. roman just filed a suit saying

fani willis's office has failed to provide documents that could prove allegations of an affair between her and another prosecutor on the case, nathan wade. today, wade was expected to answer questions about the allegations in the divorce court but the hearing was canceled after wade settled a dispute with his ex-wife. we have who is in atlanta for us outside the fulton county courthouse there. what information is alleging he is being denied? >> he is looking for correspondence, contracts, invoices. things he and his attorney would prove happened between nathan reid wade and willis. how money was budgeted and at the district attorney's office on this case. they think that they will be able to approve there was a conflict of interest between willis and wade and that they carried on this alleged affair while he was giving this given this contract by willis.

the d.a.s office is saying not so fast. not only have they provided these documents but other documents are being requested, they simply do not exist. this is where they are saying for us in a statement. he would play at this office has failed to meet its obligation under the georgia open records act. respectfully, we disagreed with your disingenuous implication. that is the response. hoping to get these documents by the hearing on february 15th and if you are member last week, we reporting exclusively that bonnie willis and nathan wade had been subpoenaed to testify at that hearing. it could be a potentially embarrassing hearing as they air out some of these alleged details of their alleged romance. he temporary settled his divorce proceedings avoiding another potential embarrassing day of having to testify in the divorce proceeding but we

should mention he is not in the clear just yet. if he does not settle this divorce, he and willis could both have to depose not just in the february 15th evidentiary hearing but in future divorce proceedings for nathan wade. the bottom line is the plot thickens and a problem for wade and willis are simply not going away. >> nick, thank you for that. former federal prosecutor renaldo mariotti is joining us to talk a little bit more about this. suing a prosecutor over an open records law. have you seen something like this before? >> it does happen, yes. in fact, it is a tool used by the defense. i have used it myself as a defense attorney. >> willis has been criticized. we should mention, for some

other posting a fundraiser for democratic opponent of one of the targets of the election diversion investigation. she and wade have not outright denied an improper relationship. how automatic is this issue still to the integrity of company others? >> i think it's fair to say that she is essentially acknowledged this in my view. in other words, she has every opportunity to deny that this occurred. she has not done so. there appears to be something to this, although we don't know all the specifics. it is problematic. it is fair to say it is extraordinarily poor judgment by willis, given that she is pursuing an extraordinary case against the former president. in terms of how problematic it it is, in the criminal matter, i think that ultimately, the

criminal cases will move forward but i think there is certainly a possibility that it's going to move forward without mr. wade working on it which could slow it down. another prosecutor could be brought in and gotten up to speed. it is possible willis will be involved in the case. i think that the fact of the matter is they are both on the same side. there is not a conflict of interest in the obvious sense. it's not like she has a relationship with somebody in the defense team or one of the witnesses but, nonetheless, there is an argument that they are going to have an incentive to keep the case going so that wade can get more money. those sorts of arguments are going to be made by the defendant and ultimately, i suspect the judge is going to find some way make this issue go away or potentially resolve the issue so that the criminal case can go forward.

>> do you think she should step aside? >> i do. she should do that voluntarily. could have somebody else in the office oversee it, for example, but i do not think she is going to do that. >> how much do you think, in terms of embarrassment was avoided? i should mention as we heard nick reporting, this is not over. there are going to be other instances where these two individuals could be. there may be more that a lot of this depending. how much embarrassment was avoided in this incident where he was able to avoid this particular thing coming to an agreement on this dispute with his ex-wife. >> at least temporarily supported, he has saved himself embarrassment, breanna. it may have been very costly

for him to do so. his ex-wife, or soon-to-be ex- wife is very unhappy about the situation presumably. is using it as leverage and she understands he did not want to be embarrassed. he did not want this out in public. we have no idea what is going on behind closed doors but i assume she is extracting a significant price in the divorce in exchange for trying to resolve this in the short run. mr. wade is paying the price for the relationship that he is in. reasonably, a happy price for it. i do not think the price that he's going to pay is over. i think he's going to continue to have to face questions in weeks to come. >> we will be looking for that. thank you for being with us. we do appreciate it. hopes of a new hostage deal

today as the situation in gaza continues to deteriorate and intentions escalate. the latest on where talks now stand.

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lighting design, negotiations are teetering on the edge. israel defense forces have been carrying out large operations in the hamas stronghold for weeks.

one group says the idea has taken the offensive into a hospital. a report that the idea is now denying. clearly, the ground situation negotiators near another hostage deal. there is a four. israeli prime minister has signaled some resistance. look at the latest from israel jeremy diamond. what are you hearing about situation >> it is a desperate in a very precarious situation. imagine the fact that thousands of displaced alison king and have been sheltering at two hospitals, exactly where the israeli military over the last week has been carrying out a major round offensive. today, the society says that israeli forces, israeli tanks are still on the ground that hospital complex. the hospital in where they say

8000 people have been sheltering, they say that papers are on the rooftop and the roads leading to the hospital report that many of the roads are blocked. military first part says it did not enter the hospital itself but they have been numerous reports of live ammunition as well as smoke grenades being fired on the grounds that hospital. meanwhile, efforts are still underway to try and secure another deal that would see a lengthy truth, weeks of appositive fighting between israel and hamas and they could see the release of dozens of israeli hostages. today, the israeli prime minister telling the families of hostages that he is fully committed to returning all of their loved ones but just yesterday, he said as well that israel does not release thousands of terrorists in order to secure this deal. he also made very clear that while hamas is pushing for an end to this war altogether, a permanent cease-fire in order to release those hostages, the

israeli prime minister is saying he will continue until total victory, making clear that he wants to achieve both objectives of this war as he has laid them out, not only securing the release of all of those hostages but also, dismantling hamas, removing it from power in the gaza strip. clearly, there are major differences to be resolved between these two sides. a lot of ground to go despite the fact that we have seen some significant momentum, progress in recent days. >> jeremy diamond, thanks so much. >> right now, big tech ceos are in the hot seat on capitol hill defending social media and their companies. let's listen to a moment that just happened up there. >> didn't take it down? >> we have reported more than 26 million examples of this kind of content. >> did not take it down until a

congressional staffer brought it up. >> in this case, maybe we made a mistake and missed something. >> we have leading teams. >> i want to talk with you about your instagram creators program and about the push. we found out through these documents that you actually are pushing forward because you want to bring kids in early. you see these younger teenagers as valuable but an untapped audience. quoting from the emails. suggesting teams are actually household influencers to bring their younger siblings into your platform, into instagram. now, how can you ensure that instagram creators, your product, your program does not facilitate illegal activities when you failed to remove content pertaining to the sale of minors. it is happening once every two

minutes in this country. >> senator, our tools for identifying that kind of content or industry-leading. that does not mean we are perfect. there are issues that we have but >> mr. zuckerberg, yes. there are a lot that are slipping through. it appears that you are trying to be the premier site in this country. >> it is not ridiculous. >> we do not want this content on our platforms. >> when you take it down? >> we do. we do more work to take it down. >> know you are not. you are not. and the problem is, we have been working on this stuff for a decade. you have an army of lawyers and lobbyists that have fought us on this every step of the way. you work with that choice to

cite our bipartisan legislation to keep kids safe online. are you going to stop funding these groups? are you going to stop lobbying against this and come to the table and work with us? yes or no? >> senator, we have a -- >> yes or no. >> of course we will work with you on the legislature. >> okay, the doors open. we got all these bills. you need to come to the table. each and every one of you need to come to the table and you need to work with us. kids are dying. >> that is a sample of what we have seen, clearly, senators are very fed up with the these tech ceos who have been quite resistant to regulation as congress has been grappling with a way to deal and they also have been somewhat ineffective as they've tried to figure out how to deal with

this issue online, the safety of children. we are seeing this play out right on capitol hill. it is ongoing. we are going to continue to keep an eye on this. you have the ceos not just of meta but tiktok, snap, discord, and ask. we will be right back with more.

you may know adam schiff's work to protect the rule of law, or to build affordable housing, or write california's patients bill of rights. but i know adam through the big brother program. we've been brothers since i was seven. he stood by my side as i graduated from yale, and i stood by his side when he married eve, the love of his life. i'm a little biased, but take it from adam's little brother. he'll make us all proud as california senator. i'm adam schiff and i approve this message.

growing up, my parents wanted me to become a doctor or an engineer. those are good careers! but i chose a different path. first, as mayor and then in the legislature. i enshrined abortion rights in our california constitution. in the face of trump, i strengthened hate crime laws and lowered the costs for the middle class. now i'm running to bring the fight to congress. you were always stubborn. and on that note, i'm evan low, and i approve this message. the dhs secretary potentially has a date of history. he could be the first cabinet official impeached and almost 150 years. the homeland security committee

announced impeachment articles against mayorkas. priscilla alvarez with some new reporting on this. how are democrats planning to do this? >> reporter: this is a bit of an unusual land interesting development for a party that has kept border security at a distance or at least mentioned it and pivoted to other issues. i have been speaking to a strategist that sees a new opportunity that really opened in the last few days as republicans move to tank the border compromise that was reached between senate negotiators. as one put it, we had a tough deal and they chickened out. that was referring to republicans. that is really the difference. the framing for democrats has always been, we pursued reform in congress but republicans did not want it. now they are taking it a step

further. this does not even include legalization for undocumented immigrants which democrats previously pushed on. this is an opportunity they are using to say, we are willing to take a tougher stance but republicans don't want that. president biden over the weekend in remarks to south carolina democrats mentioned border security, taking it to this deal. he said he would shut down the border if given the authority. the campaign said they would focus on former president trump and his record on immigration. they said that americans want a balanced approach but ultimately the last few days they have started to give a preview of how democrats may start to use the deal in their favor. >> thank you for that report. we are keeping an eye on capitol hill. a hearing of these top tech ceos. this has grown heated at several points over the course of the day. questions about whether their platforms are safe for children in america. about what they are doing and not doing. we will have much more of this

ahead on cnn news central.

we have new developments in a disturbing story. a man is in custody accused of severing his father's had and posting an extremely graphic video on youtube. the video was removed hours later, not before racking up thousands of views. it's a shocking development as

tech executives testify about harms of social media. danny freeman has been tracking this. what happened here? >> reporter: what happened here was absolutely from horrific and gruesome. we are learning a lot of new details over the course of the day about exactly what led to this crime. this all started out around 7:00 p.m. last night. that is when milltown township police got a call from a woman saying there was a dead man in her house. that man was her husband. the suspect in the case was their son. when officers arrived at the house, i will just say what they found was truly disturbing. they found the father in the downstairs bathroom. he had been decapitated. officers also found a machete in the house. they also found a large kitchen knife and the man's head.

according to the criminal complaint, at that point police officers tried to traction the man down because they did not find him at the house. that's when they were alerted to the video posted to youtube in which he rented about the biden administration, the border, even declaring himself the acting president because of martial law and saying that his father was a traitor to his country because his father was a federal employee. he actually held up his father's severed head in the video. the good news is that not very long after police were able to track them down. he was about 100 miles west of the crime scene. we learned in the past few hours that at that point around 9:00, so two hours after police were called to the house, broke into a national guard base and that is where police were ultimately able to apprehend him. they were able to take him into custody without incident. it is a hard and challenging

story for this community. >> that is disturbing. danny freeman, thank you for the update. minutes from now the federal reserve will make a decision on interest rates. will they hold steady, or could we see a rate cut? we will have that for you in just a few moments.