Marcus Bleasdale knows more about what goes into your smartphone than you'd ever want to hear about it. The British photographer has been documenting unthinkable violence in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) since 1999.
During that time, tens of thousands of child soldiers have been a part of conflict that has led to more than 5 million deaths. At the heart of this violence are what are called "conflict minerals," including gold and diamonds. More recently, three other conflict minerals — tantalum, tungsten and tin — have come into focus because they are used to produced smartphones, laptops, tablets, cameras and other electronic devices.
See also: How to Follow Social Good Summit Online
We caught up with Bleasdale Sunday morning before he took the stage at Social Good Summit.
"Anyone in today's world is using a significant amount of electronics products," he told Mashable. "All of these consumable products have, at some time, had conflict minerals from Congo in them. We as consumers should be appalled by that."
Bleasdale said the violence really hits home when he sees an 11-year-old child, the same age as his niece, forced to tote an assault riffle. He also called sexual violence "the weapon of choice" by warlords in the DRC. About 40,000 women were raped in the DRC during a 12-month period in 2006-2007, according to a report published in the American Journal of Public Health.
The solution, Bleasdale argues, is not to refrain from buying electronic products.
"I'm probably the worst user of conflict minerals on the planet; I'm a photographer with five camera bodies and two computers and phones," he said. "I walk around with half a Congolese mine in my bag everyday."
Instead, Bleasdale said consumers should demand that technology companies produce products that are free of conflict minerals. As part of the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform bill, American companies now have to audit their supply chains and disclose whether their minerals come from mines run by armed groups in the DRC.
The Enough Project releases an annual report, rating how companies are progressing to remove these minerals from their supply chains. Bleasdale said that 10% of mines in the DRC are now conflict mineral free.
"We have a long way to go, but I do see that there's an opportunity for change," he said. "Three years ago there were none, so slowly the industry can see that it needs to change."
Bleasdale's photographs will accompany a story on conflict minerals in the DRC in the October 125th anniversary issue of National Geographic magazine. The gallery below contains a sample of the images that will appear in the article.
A child is put to work at a militia-run mine in Watsa.
Workers rip the earth apart in search of gold at the Sufferance mine in the Ituri region. Much of Congo’s gold, more than $600 million worth a year, is smuggled across borders.
A boy waits his turn for spoonfuls of rice and beans in Pluto. In some areas of eastern Congo up to 40 percent of gold miners are children, often forcibly recruited by militias.
Already a soldier, a boy with an assault rifle pedals to base camp during fighting in the Ituri region in 2003. Photographer Marcus Bleasdale says that of all of his images from the Congo, this one has provoked the most response from the public.

The Social Good Summit is where big ideas meet new media to create innovative solutions and is brought to you by Mashable, The 92nd Street Y, The United Nations Foundation, The United Nations Development Programme, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Ericsson. Held during U.N. Week, the Social Good Summit unites a dynamic community of global leaders to discuss a big idea: the power of innovative thinking and technology to solve our greatest challenges.
Date: Sept. 22 through Sept. 24 Time: 12 to 6 p.m. each day Location: 92nd Street Y, 1395 Lexington Ave., New York, N.Y. Tickets are sold-out, but tune into the Livestream.
BONUS: 10 Empowering Apps for Social Good
Gone are the days of daring your friends without consequences. When you challenge your friends to Budge, the person who loses the challenge needs to donate an agreed upon amount to a charity of the winner's choosing.
Available on iOS.
Charity Miles lets you raise money for your favorite causes while walking, running or biking. The app's corporate sponsors donate 25 cents for each mile you walk or run, and 10 cents for each mile you bike.
Charity Miles is available for iOS and Android.
With every photo you share, Johnson & Johnson donates $1 to a cause of your choosing. The Donate a Photo app, available on iOS and Android, also lets you follow your friends' photos, so you can keep up with your social life.
Great for foodies, photographers and humanitarians, this iOS app adds a great cause to your foodstagrams. When you dine and snap a food shot at one of the participating restaurants -- which, for now, are only in New York -- a meal is donated to a non-profit feeding schoolchildren in South Africa.
In this free iOS game, you'll travel with Maya, an Indian girl, as she navigates the slums in search of clean water. The longer it takes her to find water, the more school she misses.
The game was created in partnership with charity: water, which lends in-game missions and video scenes to the app.
Did you know that with the money you save cooking three of your own meals, you could fund someone's HIV medicine for three months? Instead is an iOS app that shows you how much you can save with simple tweaks in your lifestyle. Once you make those cheaper decisions, Instead encourages you to donate to a non-profit out of your savings.
My Life as a Refugee is an app for iOS and Android created by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). It lets anyone around the world experience life fleeing from conflict or persecution. Through beautiful illustrations, you'll read the stories of the app's many characters, who have been separated from their loved ones and have experienced hardships.
The Recyclebank app, available for iOS and Android, rewards you for recycling. The gamification of recycling awards points that you can redeem in stores and in the app.
Forget daily deal apps -- there are apps that give back while giving you a great deal. TangoTab, available for iOS and Android, donates meals to food banks every time a diner purchases one of its restaurant deals.
Eager for a new volunteer program? This iOS app brings the online volunteer network onto your smartphone. It has a sleek interface that will help you find great opportunities to give back near you.
VolunteerMatch lets you select which skill you're looking to use to volunteer, so you can lend your expert web design or managerial skills, for example.
Image: Marcus Bleasdale/National Geographic