The US Department of Justice and state attorneys general will hold a meeting before the end of this month to decide over the issue of whether the social media platforms are “intentionally stifling the free exchange of ideas,” the department said on Wednesday.

The statement did use the name of Facebook and Twitter in this regard despite the fact that the executives of both the social media bigwigs testified before the Congress on Wednesday. But both the firms apart from other ones have faced harsh criticism by the President of United States Donald Trump along with some of his fellow Republicans too raising words against them in what they term as an attempt to repress conservative voices.

Both the companies have denied of any such bias attitude.

US Attorney General Jeff Sessions convened the meeting, slated for September 25, “to discuss a growing concern that these companies may be hurting competition and intentionally stifling the free exchange of ideas on their platforms,” Justice Department spokesman Devin O’Malley said.

There is no clarification available regarding the state general attorneys about who would attend the meeting. Many representatives for the attorneys general in New York, Connecticut and Iowa clarified that they had not been communicated in this regard.

Market shares belonging to social media companies dipped on Wednesday as the executives held testified before the lawmakers. The shares of Twitter went down by 6.1 percent and of Facebook around 2.3 percent lower in late afternoon trading. Around one percent of shares sank belonging to Google parent company Alphabet Inc.

Yesterday, Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg and Twitter Chief Executive Jack Dorsey testified at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing about the efforts being made by them to deter foreign elements from swaying any influence on US elections and political discourse.

The alleged Russian efforts to influence US public opinion throughout Trump’s presidency has been under examination by the Senate panel. The move was initiated after US intelligence agencies concluded that some entities supported by Russia wanted to boost his chances of winning the elections of US Presidency in 2016.

Both the executives, Sandberg and Dorsey said that the companies had taken many measures to fight against such influence attempts, but lawmakers were of the view that much more was needed to be done and suggested Congress take legislative action.

“Clearly, this problem is not going away. I’m not even sure it’s trending in the right direction,” said Senator Richard Burr, the committee’s Republican chairman.

Senator Mark Warner, the committee’s top Democrat said, “I’m skeptical that, ultimately, you’ll be able to truly address this challenge on your own. Congress is going to have to take action here.”

A bill passed earlier this year and signed by Trump to make it a law resembles this legislation which addresses the use of social media for political disinformation. The earlier law had made it very for state prosecutors and sex trafficking victims to sue social media companies, advertisers and many others who failed to keep exploitative material off their sites.

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