My Daughter Maia's life Matters. Make it Matter

My daughter Maia died on 06/10/2022, through an act of self-harm gone wrong. This action was promoted to Maia via her Tiktok account, via her video feed. She was trying to place marks on her neck to dramatise a discussion she was having with her friends about a boy she liked. She had already successfully tried this 3 weeks earlier, On her second try, it led to a tragedy, and this act cost Maia her life.

Maia had no intention of leaving her life because she was playing Terreria and Minecraft, had been online shopping for her birthday gifts, and placed 8 items in her basket, intending to send me the link, so that I would have a clue what to get her for her upcoming 14th birthday, on top of the money she had asked for, for her birthday.

Tragicly this birthday wasn't to be, for I received a phone call of such a disastrous magnitude, no parent could even contemplate, hearing the screaming words from Maia's mum, 'Liam, Maia's dead'.

The beginning of my world falling apart, started with racing to my daughter who was dead on her hospital bed. Walking into the A&E in Stevenage, to be greeted by 15 plus emergency professionals, who looked at the floor as I walked into the ward. I will never forget this walk, the walk of doom, absolutely complete and utter doom.

I sat next to Maia and rubbed her belly, and ran my fingers through her beautiful hair, I asked Maia, What on earth has happened Maia, what has happened?

To this day I still don't know what has happened. The Police had her iPad iPhone and laptop for 5 months and didn't make any progress in getting to Maia's data. So that we could begin piecing together the last moments of her life.

I asked for the equipment back, to see if we could try, and fortunately, this led to Maia's mum, cracking into Maia's iPad. Subsequently, the rest followed. Unfortunately, as the Police had Maia's equipment for 150 days, her watch feed had disappeared from her Apps, as it does on day 90.

I researched the Apps on Maia's iPhone and all of them state that the data can be downloaded, with the request from appropriate legal channels in the event of a death, what this means in the UK, is that the Coroner must request this formally, and then it will be supplied.

To this date, 7 months on, Maia's coroner's office has yet to request the Data from Tiktok, Instagram, Reddit, or Discord, as was asked for in the case of Molly Rose Russell, in Harrow in 2017. Molly's inquest took 5 years for the data to be released by Meta, and when it was given to the court, it revealed what was suspected all along, that Algorithm video feeds on Molly's social media, had continuously fed into her video feeds, videos of self-harm.

Thankfully some senior executives from Molly's social media Apps were called to her inquest and were asked to explain the nature of the content in Molly's data history and explain how such poisonous content could be played to a 14-year-old child. They apologised for the content and assured the court that they take online child safety of the utmost importance, Blah blah blah.....

The conclusion to the above inquest took place in Middlesex on 10/10/2022. Meanwhile, in the next county, Hertfordshire, My daughter Maia lay dead in the hospital morgue.

During the early summer of 2022, I watched Archie Battersby's mother's struggles with the accident regarding Archie, and Hollie's insistence that she wanted his Tiktok account data investigated. Unfortunately, Archie ultimately lost his fight for life, and at the subsequent inquest, in front of the world's press, and Archies legal team, the Coroners court professed that there was no evidence presented that could conclude that Tiktok, and the content that Archie watched, could be accountable for Archie's accident.

Through my journey, I have discovered that there are 2 forms of data download, The first being held on the App interface on the phone for 90 days, and the second full and concise download available for any country's legal system to request through the legal channels, in the UK this could be requested through the Coroners office with the submission of the child's death certificate.

I have discovered that this is not happening in any sudden death of a child, in any instance, other than the 5-year struggle endured by Molly Rose Russell's family, through the Middlesex Coroners office at the legal insistence of Russell's legal team.

So there isn't any investigation into the possibility of third-party online involvement in the death of a child. Nothing, this isn't even a process. Therefore there is no Judicial process in the UK, and this has yet to be determined as necessary for the sudden death of a child.

Isn't this a missed opportunity to establish the full facts that lead up to the sudden death of a child?

The Police cannot possibly establish the full facts in a child's death if they don't sufficiently interrogate the child mobile phone data. therefore any case presented to a coroner's court in the UK, without the submission of the child's phone data is merely surmising, and cannot be relied upon for facts in the death of a child.

Who knows how many children have died? with the facts of their death not being sufficiently established, with these surmisings presented in court.

I question if the UK courts understand the difference between a handset download and a server download from the company's source. Tiktok, Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat and others all publicly agree to the sharing of data, to a court following the Judicial process is applied.

Why is this not happening?

I can see no reason why it isn't happening, and if it takes 5 years or more as with the Russell family, so be it as far as I am concerned, my daughter Maia's death merits a transparent and concise investigation into her online data, to at the very least eliminate possible negative sources of influence, and detect a crime has been committed or not.

The current system is take everything at face value, and the words 'probably and likely' are often used in the description of the lead-up to a person's death.

Never in the course of human history, have we had as much ability to harvest a person's data, to determine their online activities, even offline activities, like previous locations. This is a powerful tool that isn't being utilised by our authorities. How many other Baby P's deaths are not being identified by our Authorities in the sudden death of a child?

How many more children must die, before Apps switch off algorithms for children under the age of 16?

Algorithms are a marketing tool used by Apps and websites, to target your interests towards you the user. Excellent if shopping for a product, destructive if your looking up negative content, or have looked even out of curiosity. Whatever you search, the Algorithm picks up on your search, registers your interest in what you searched, and bombards you with that content, now you the user, have become unwittingly become a participant in a marketing exercise with the App, and the App will not stop until it registers your interest has changed. This is a dangerous activity to be unwittingly involved in, especially if you're at a low point in your mood for instance.

Is this Algorithm grooming?

Grooming is when a person builds a relationship with a child, young person or an adult who's at risk so they can abuse them and manipulate them into doing things. The abuse is usually sexual or financial, but it can also include other illegal acts