Countries are curbing the power of Big Tech companies such as Facebook and Google by regulating anti-competitive behavior and content moderation, imposing high fines for rule violations, and threatening to break them up.
Much of this global activity has influenced U.S. lawmakers to move to crack down on tech firms. Federal agencies are suing tech giants, including Facebook and Google, for anti-competitive behavior. Meanwhile, members of Congress have introduced bipartisan legislation regulating online platforms and are considering breaking some firms up altogether.
Democrats and Republicans in Congress are also focused on trying to overhaul or eliminate Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the liability shield for digital platforms, which the GOP says allows social media companies to censor conservative speech online unfairly.
The U.S. investigations, lawsuits, and legislation related to Big Tech companies will likely have global ramifications, but steps taken by other nations could, in turn, affect the speed and severity with which the United States handles such issues as well.
Australia
In late February, the Australian Parliament passed a controversial bill requiring platforms such as Facebook and Google to compensate news outlets and publishers in order to link their content on news feeds or search results.
The law requires platforms to negotiate with publishers on payment, and if a deal is not struck, a government-appointed arbitrator decides on the final price. Facebook temporarily blocked Australian news publishers and users from viewing or sharing any news content in response to the measure.
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China
In the past few months, China has taken significant steps to stop monopolistic behavior in the realm of internet and digital payment services. New antitrust rules formalized in February are meant to block tech platforms from making users choose between the country’s leading internet players, a common practice in the Chinese market.
The new anti-monopoly guidelines are expected to take aim at big Chinese conglomerates such as e-commerce company Alibaba and mobile payment services, including Alipay and WeChat Pay.
China’s competition watchdog, the State Administration for Market Regulation, said it wants to “stop monopolistic behaviours in the platform economy and protect fair competition in the market.”
The new regulations are also expected to punish companies from using anti-competitive technologies, using data and algorithms to exploit the market and to prevent price fixing.
The Chinese government made headlines in the past few months for a coordinated regulatory crackdown to stop the owner of Alibaba, billionaire Jack Ma, from expanding and going through with a planned blockbuster initial public offering. Alibaba’s subsidiary Ant Group in December was told by the Chinese government to curb its plans to expand beyond payments into insurance, lending, and wealth management.
The Chinese regulators have not yet outlined how harsh they will be in implementing these new anti-monopoly rules, although the penalties could range from blocking mergers and acquisitions to fines, all the way up to breaking up big firms.
European Union
The European Union in December unveiled a landmark Digital Services and Markets Acts that makes Big Tech companies more responsible for illegal content and products sold on their platforms and tries to stop them from putting their own services ahead of competitors. The bundle of laws is part of the EU’s larger mission to tackle the monopolistic behavior of U.S. tech giants such as Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google.
Digital platforms that don’t comply with the Digital Markets Act could have fines as high as 10% of their annual global revenue. Furthermore, companies that break the EU laws multiple times could even be required to break up parts of their business.
The EU has thus far fined Google $10 billion for antitrust violations in the past few years in connection to the search giant’s advertising, shopping, and mobile services. The EU has also charged Amazon for breaking its competition laws by taking advantage of third-party sellers’ data to profit itself and has launched two antitrust investigations into Apple.
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Hungary
Hungary’s government earlier this year announced it will regulate content moderation standards. The regulations were proposed soon after former President Donald Trump was banned from Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms.
“All we want to achieve against big tech firms is that they operate in a legal, transparent and controllable way,” Hungarian Justice Minister Judit Varga said in a Facebook post in January, adding that relevant legislation will be filed later in the spring.
She added that the bill would “regulate the domestic operations of large tech companies.”
The government of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said in January the new regulations were needed because it will not tolerate intrusions on free speech.
India
India has tightened its grip on social media companies significantly in the past couple of months in regard to what can and can’t be said online.
Citing concerns about social media abuse, the Indian government in late February released new guidelines expected to regulate digital news organization, social media, and other content providers.
The new rules are part of Section 79 of the Information Technology Act, which provides legal immunity to online platforms that host user-generated content, similar to the U.S.’s Section 230. However, India’s Section 79 gives social media companies legal protection for user content only if the user adheres to government-prescribed guidelines.
The new rules prescribe what is considered prohibited content online and how to deal with complaints from users. Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and WhatsApp will now be required to appoint a grievance officer to deal with user complaints, who must respond to the complaint within 24 hours and resolve it within 15 days of receipt.
The government has outlined 10 categories of content that social media platforms should not carry, including content that is obscene, insulting or harassing based on gender, racially or ethnically objectionable, threatens the unity or sovereignty of India, and any content contrary to the laws of the country.
The new regulations state that after a platform is informed that it is hosting prohibited content from the appropriate government agency, it should then remove the content within 36 hours.
For video content providers such as YouTube and Netflix, the government is requiring content to be self-classified into five categories based on age suitability.
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In an example of how far the government was willing to go to control online content, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi demanded Twitter remove 500 accounts that were being critical of his leadership during recent farmer protests. Twitter initially refused, saying that it wouldn’t follow orders inconsistent with Indian law but eventually relented after its employees in India were threatened with arrest.
