House Panel Says Big Tech Has Monopoly Power, Recommends Anti-Trust Reforms

A Democrat-led House panel found that Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google have monopoly power and recommended a number of measures to reign the companies in, according to a long-awaited report released on Tuesday.

The Democratic report details the House Judiciary panel on antitrusts 16-month investigation into the tech giants, which included the review of more than one million documents and testimony in and out of hearings as well as interviews with hundreds in the industry.

While the investigation had been billed as a bipartisan effort, Republicans and Democrats have clashed on policy recommendations coming out of the investigation.

Representative Ken Buck , the key swing vote on the committee and an advocate of antitrust reform, wrote in a draft memo earlier this week that some of the reports recommendations are non-starters for conservatives, though he outlined areas of common ground between the parties.

He said he is supportive of the investigation and its findings and will continue to push for bipartisan antitrust reform.

Democrats recommended structural separation, which would require large companies to pursue a single line of business; nondiscrimination requirements; regulations preventing platforms from self-preferencing; and a freeze on mergers and acquisitions by companies that already dominate an industry.

In his own report, signed by three other Republicans, Buck rejected a number of Democrats recommendations, including structural separation as well as the elimination of arbitration clauses and opening up companies to class action lawsuits.

He adds that Democrats failed to address how Big Tech has used its monopolistic position in the marketplace to censor speech. Representative Jim Jordan , a ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, issued his own response as well in which he accused the platforms of holding a bias against conservatives.

Many of the proposals bandied about in todays reports whether breaking up companies or undercutting Section 230 would cause real harm to consumers, Americas technology leadership and the U.S.

Original article
Author: Brittany Bernstein

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