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Members of the U.S. House of Representatives have introduced five different bills that seek to domesticate the power of the world’s largest technology companies, in the biggest legislative threat to Big Tech in recent years.
If approved, the proposals would together constitute the biggest shake-up of the U.S. monopoly law in a generation, halting technology industry acquisitions of the kind that consolidated Facebook’s dominance of social media and limited the ability to ‘Apple, Amazon and Google use their platforms to promote their own products.
“Right now, unregulated technology monopolies have too much power over our economy,” David Cicilline, Democratic chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives ’antitrust subcommittee, said when he announced the bills Friday.
Big tech companies “are in a unique position to pick winners and losers, destroy small businesses, raise prices for consumers and stop people from working,” he said.
U.S. politicians have for years promised to pass relevant technology regulations, such as a digital privacy bill, but have been hampered by a lack of bipartisan agreement on the issue.
However, members of the House who subscribe to support the five bills include both Democrats and Republicans, a sign of the anger both sides feel toward global technology companies.
Ken Buck, the top Republican on the antitrust subcommittee, said, “Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google have prioritized power over innovation and harmed American businesses and consumers in the process.”
Bills would adopt many of the recommendations made in a 448-page report published by the Cicilline subcommittee last year, which accused the four companies of abusing their market power and followed the hearings, including one with the four chief executives. This report was only signed by Democrats, suggesting that Republican members of Congress have changed their position.
Details of the five tickets
The first of five bills would let companies use their platforms to drive their own products. Amazon has been criticized in particular for using its market-leading online store to give prominence to the products the company has manufactured. Last year’s report found that Amazon routinely uses data from third-party sellers to help improve and sell its own products.
The second would prevent large technology companies from compressing potential competitors. This bill reflects Capitol Hill’s rage at allowing Facebook to buy WhatsApp and Instagram, which helped consolidate its power on social media.
The third would let companies use their platforms and products to drive other products they own. Google, for example, has been accused of manipulating its search engine to highlight its own products, such as Google Shopping, when these services would not normally rank highly in Google search.
The fourth bill would oblige companies to make it easier for customers to take data and profiles online and transfer them to another service.
The fifth would make the filing of certain mergers more expensive, in an effort to give more money to the justice department and the Federal Trade Commission to carry out enforcement actions.
If passed by the House of Representatives, the main obstacle to making laws law would be in the Senate, where Republicans have enough votes to filibuster new legislation. Mitch McConnell, leader of the Senate Republicans, is generally considered a supporter of big business, but has said relatively little about Great computer company.
Neil Bradley, director general of policy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said in a statement: “Invoices for specific companies, rather than focusing on business practices, are simply bad policy and are fundamentally unfair. they may be considered unconstitutional “.
Google and Facebook declined to comment. Apple and Amazon did not respond to requests to do so.
Additional reports from Hannah Murphy, Richard Waters, Dave Lee and Patrick McGee
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