The bosses of Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon have been heard for more than five hours on their practices concurentielles and their relation to freedom of expression.
From the outset, the tone is set. “They have too much power”, has assené David Cicilline, the chairman of the sub-committee on competition. And “they will certainly emerge (of the pandemic) in an even stronger and more powerful than before”. 100 days of the us presidential election, this hearing of the GAFA could not be as highly political. The elect were given free rein Wednesday, for 5 hours, to years of frustration vis-à-vis the corporate tentacles that dominate the global internet. With questions that sometimes had nothing to do with their business practices.
Sundar Pichai (Alphabet, home of Google), Tim Cook (Apple), Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) and Jeff Bezos (Amazon), were interviewed via videoconference by the judicial commission of the House of representatives in Washington, who survey the past year about the possible abuse of a dominant position. Each board policy, the critics were showering.
The GAFA crush their competitors and democracy, have hammered the democrats ; the GAFA we censor, have tempêté the republicans. Even the president, Donald Trump had taken his word before the hearing : “If the Congress does not force the ‘Big Tech’ to be fair, what they should have done years ago, I will do it myself with decrees”, he threatened on Twitter before the start of the session.
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economic Model in question
The elected democrats are mostly concentrated on the economic model of the giants of the tech. They tried to prove that these groups use the mountains of personal data at their disposal and the acquisitions of competitors to prevent, illegally, any competitor to emerge, to the detriment of consumers, of citizens, innovation and democracy.
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“Google has become the portal of access to the internet and the abuse of power,” argued David Cicilline after a series of questions to Sundar Pichai. “It has become a fenced garden, ( … ), which provides, virtually, that any company that wants to be found online must pay a fee to Google. The boss of the giant of the tech has also been accused of letting Google steal content from other companies – such as Yelp – and to divert clicks from their sites.
An internal memo has also been mentioned, according to which Google is complaining that some sites attracted “too much traffic”. Response to Sundar Pichai : “a Member of Congress, just like other businesses, we try to understand the trends emerging from, you know, data, that we can see, and we use it to improve our products for users.
As often during this hearing, the patron of GAFA had little time to express themselves, were often cut off and appeared to be on the defensive. Jerry Nadler, the chairman of the commission, for its part, attacked Mark Zuckerberg on the ground of acquisitions. “Facebook saw Instagram as a threat ( … ) so (…) they have been redeemed”, he accused.
The data as a “candy store”
Jeff Bezos, for whom this was the first appearance before a parliamentary committee, has also taken to his rank. “Amazon is only interested in the exploitation of its monopoly on online sales,” said David Cicilline. “His dual role of host and marchand on the same platform is fundamentally anti-competitive. The Congress needs to take action”.
To support this, the elected Pramila Jayapal has quoted a former employee of Amazon: “(the chiefs) we just say: ‘do not use in the data’. But it is a real candy store, everyone has access to everything he wants”.
Answer – evasive – from Bezos : “We have put in place certain safeguards. we train people on the policy, we expect that people follow this policy as we would with the other. It is a voluntary policy. If we find that someone has violated, we will take action against them.”
Tim Cook has been interviewed on the same topic – his quality of judge and party, on its platform of applications, the app store – but was relatively spared compared to the other groups.
“Hunt for conservative,” or the accusations of censorship
republicans, Greg Steube (republican party) has questioned Sundar Pichai on its e-mail campaign that “happen routinely in the folder spam”, a sign, according to him, of a conspiracy against the conservatives. Because inevitably, at least 100 days of the presidential election, many questions have focused on social networks and their relation to freedom of expression.
“The Big Tech have opened the hunt for the conservatives, it is a fact”, has launched Jim Jordan, one of the close allies of Donald Trump, claiming that the platforms had to reduce the republicans in the silence. He then warned that it was time for them to “face the consequences”.
He has also accused Google of being an ally of China (the search engine is not accessible since 20 years) and had tried to promise the patron of the group that his services “would not be custom-fitted to help Joe Biden (the candidate democrate) to win by 2020” the presidential election. As stated in the New York Post, Jordan had to repeat the question several times before Pichai responds : “You have my commitment”.
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On the competition – which was supposed to be the central subject – several of the republican members of the commission consider to be “great” is not a tare, and can even serve to “do good”.
fiber patriotic highlighted
Combined, the GAFA are worth around 4780 billions of dollars in the Stock market. Billionaires Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg are in the top 5 of the richest men in the world. Their bosses have had few opportunities to respond to the accusations, apart from during their opening remarks, where they bragged about their “success stories” to the u.s. to appeal to the fibre patriotic elected officials. It must be said that this theme was repeated often, including at the time about the refusal of Google to help the Pentagon build an infrastructure of cloud data, as explained in the New York Times.
Their companies, “proudly american”, as was said by Mark Zuckerberg prior to the hearing, owe their success to the values and laws of the country – democracy, freedom, innovation, etc “there are no guarantees that our values will win. For example, China built its own version of the internet on very different ideas, and exports this vision in other countries”, insisted the young billionaire.
the owners of The giants of tech have put forward their contribution to growth, investment, job creation in the United States, and provided encouraging competition while facing fierce competition. Not convince David Cicilline: “These companies have a monopoly. Some need to be split up, others need to regulate and made responsible for their actions,” he concluded.
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The judicial commission investigation for months about the possible abuse of a dominant position, but the hearing is unlikely to have major consequences, if it is not, perhaps, to prepare new and stronger laws for the digital platforms.
