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House lawmakers on Friday introduced sweeping antitrust legislation aimed at constraining the power of big tech companies and avoiding corporate mergers. If passed, the bills would be the most ambitious update to monopoly laws in decades.
The bills – five in total – directly target Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google and their control of online commerce, information and entertainment. The proposals will make it easier to break up companies that have used their dominance in one area to gain a stronghold in another, create new obstacles to takeover of emerging competitors and enable regulators to provide more money to police companies.
Legislation can reshape the way companies operate. For example, Facebook and Google can have a higher bar for proving that any mergers are not anti-competitive. Amazon may face more scrutiny when selling its brand name products like toilet paper and clothing. Apple may have a harder time getting into new business areas that are being promoted in its App Store.
“Right now, unregulated technology monopolies have a lot of power over our economy. They are in a unique position to pick winners and losers, destroy small businesses, raise prices on consumers, and drive people out,” said Representative David Cicilline, a Rhode Island Democrat and chair of the Antitrust Subcommittee. From work.” “Our agenda will level the playing field and ensure that the richest and most powerful tech monopolies operate by the same rules as the rest of us.”
Introducing the bills, which have some bipartisan support, is the biggest challenge yet from Capitol Hill to Silicon Valley’s tech giants, who have thrived for years without regulation or many constraints on expanding their businesses. Last year, the Antitrust Subcommittee issued a scathing report on the industry after a 16-month investigation, declaring that Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google engaged in a variety of monopolistic behavior. The proposals released on Friday attempt to address the concerns detailed in the report.
Over the past decade, dozens of bills addressing data privacy, speech responsibility, and child online safety have failed. But efforts to curb the dominance of the biggest tech companies have gained broad support in recent years. During the Trump administration, the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission have accused Google and Facebook of anti-competitive practices and have filed lawsuits expected to be fought for years. Democrats and Republicans point to the dominance of a handful of companies as the root cause of the spread of misinformation, job and wage inequality, and arbitrary rules of online expression.
Tech giants face similar challenges to their power around the world, including antitrust investigations in Europe and new legislation in Australia and India to limit their power.
“This is just the kind of new law we need to tackle the problem of gatekeeper power through the dominant digital platforms,” said Charlotte Solomon, competition director at Public Knowledge, a public interest group. Big tech companies have many powerful tools to protect their monopolies. These laws will give antitrust enforcement agencies a few powerful tools to open up the digital platform market to competition.”
The bills represented a confrontation with the powerful armies of influence in the tech industry. Over the past decade, the industry has amassed the largest group of lobbyists in Washington, companies sponsor think tanks, fund academic papers and employ the largest antitrust litigation firms to defend their businesses.
Some of the proposals are likely to gain widespread support among lawmakers, including one focused on getting more funding for antitrust agencies through higher merger fees; The Senate recently passed a similar bill. Another bill that could gain traction would give consumers the ability to transfer their digital history to other websites, weakening the stranglehold that big companies like Facebook have over personal data.
But it will be difficult to pass other bills. One would make it illegal for a company like Google, which has a dominant search engine, to own another company that relies heavily on online search. For example, the company will not be allowed to favor search results for its YouTube video service under the new law, and may be required to separate the video business if it favors it over competitors. Another bill would prevent a dominant company from using its weight to exclude competitors and from demanding terms, such as purchasing goods and services from the company, and the terms of others who want access to its platform.
Adam Kovacevich, president of Chamber of Progress, a lobby group that includes members of Big Tech, said consumers would be denied popular products if the bills were successful.
“Banning amenities such as Amazon Basics brand batteries, Apple’s Find My Phone tool or Google Maps appearing in Google search results are ideas that will provoke a backlash from consumers,” he said.
Facebook and Google declined to comment. Amazon and Apple did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Some smaller tech companies have praised the billing.
Roku, the maker of online streaming devices, said in a statement that the biggest tech companies are “blatantly ignoring” existing antitrust laws and hurting consumers.
“A set of drastic reforms are needed to prevent a future in which these monopolists further abuse consumer choice and impede access to innovative and independent products,” the company said.
Antitrust experts say the bills will embolden law enforcers who have become constrained by court decisions that have narrowed interpretations of century-old antitrust laws.
Eleanor M. said: Fox, a New York University law professor: “This is a reaction to the fact that our antitrust laws have been narrowly interpreted by the Supreme Court.” “Because of this issue, it is very appropriate for Congress to step in to ban and determine what is bad and what is good for markets.”
Republicans are divided on aspects of the bills. Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado, a Republican on the subcommittee, has been a vocal critic of the power of big tech companies. But he also insisted that aspects of the laws be narrowed to ensure that small businesses are not involved in the changes.
Mr. Buck, like other Republicans, has been particularly critical of social media companies’ power of speech and alleged censorship of conservative political figures by Facebook and Google.
He said, “This legislation breaks Big Tech’s monopoly power to control what Americans see and say online, fosters an online marketplace that encourages innovation and provides small American businesses with a fair playing field. Doing nothing is not an option. We just act now.”
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