Big Tech's Latest Anti-Trust Argument: Regulation Will Help Russian Propaganda

The anti-trust spaghetti strategy: throw a claim against the wall and see if it sticks. Most in Washington are calling BS, but it's a clever adaptation to current events. JL

Cristiano Lima reports in the Washington Post, image Bryce Durbin, Tech Crunch:

The tech industry has a new line of attack against antitrust proposals: legislation reining in industry giants would make it harder to crack down on Russian disinformation. But the new argument sidesteps a key fact: The measures expressly prohibit organizations deemed a national security risk or backed by foreign adversaries from co-opting the main protections in the bills. They’ve previously argued the proposals would harm American innovation and national security.

The tech industry has a new line of attack against lawmakers’ antitrust proposals: legislation aimed at reining in industry giants would inadvertently make it harder for those companies to crack down on Russian disinformation.  It’s the latest complaint in a campaign by industry-backed groups to chip away at Congress’s most aggressive antitrust bills. They’ve previously argued the proposals would harm American innovation and national security.  But the new argument sidesteps a key fact: The measures expressly prohibit organizations deemed a national security risk or backed by foreign adversaries from co-opting the main protections in the bills. And its proponents say the broader criticisms rely on a bad-faith misreading of the bill.  “Big Tech’s cynical and manipulative misrepresentations of our antitrust efforts are as reprehensible as they are false — another crass attempt to avoid well-founded and urgent scrutiny,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who is leading one of the proposals, the Open App Markets Act. Blumenthal added that his bill “simply does not require app stores to carry specific apps and would not allow foreign state media to bring lawsuits.” It comes as lawmakers on Capitol Hill are racing to pass a series of blockbuster measures before the midterm elections that could change the competitive landscape in Silicon Valley.

At odds are a pair of bills that seek to block technology giants from giving their own products preferential treatment over those of their competitors, including on app stores.  Proponents say the legislation is sorely needed to crack down on competitive abuses by dominant platforms. But groups funded by industry giants and some civil society groups have voiced concern that parts of the bills could give known purveyors of misinformation or hate speech a way to get back on major platforms when they are booted off.  That’s partly because one of the bills would bar the tech giants from discriminating against “similarly situated businesses,” a phrasing critics argue could give groups removed for breaking platform policies a legal recourse.  Now, some of the same groups are arguing that the tactic could be weaponized by foreign interests including Russian state media, which the platforms have cracked down on amid the war in Ukraine. Chamber of Progress CEO Adam Kovacevich, who has been sounding the alarm about the matter on Twitter, argued the proposals would limit the ability of companies like Google, Apple or Facebook to take action against Russian state media outlets like RT and Sputnik.  “The pressure that Big Tech platforms have received to remove RT and Sputnik shows that most people want platforms to curate for safety, security and community standards,” he told The Technology 202. “But these bills would undermine that curation.” Matt Schruers, president of the tech trade group CCIA, said the proposals would “tie those services’ hands” in the face of products linked to foreign interests. “Another outright lie from Big Tech’s mouthpiece,” said Jane Meyer, a spokesperson for Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), who is spearheading one of the bills. The Chamber of Progress is a left-leaning tech group backed by Amazon, Apple and Facebook parent Meta. CCIA counts Amazon, Apple and Google as members. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post.) There’s a major hole in the argument, however: Both of the antitrust bills explicitly exclude organizations owned or controlled by foreign governments from using their protections as legal tools, as well as any groups that pose a national security risk.

Emma Llansó, a director of the Center for Democracy and Technology’s (CDT) Free Expression Project, said both bills “have provisions that would minimize the concerns specifically as far as foreign-state-owned businesses go.” The remarks are notable, given that CDT had previously voiced concern about the bills’ impact on efforts to crack down on disinformation and hate speech more broadly. The nonprofit receives funding from companies that include Facebook, Amazon and Apple. Still, Llansó said there could still be some “gray areas” where it’s not abundantly clear whether a developer or digital service provider is backed by a foreign government or a security risk. CCIA’s Schruers nodded to these concerns, saying the legislation could offer protection for “Russian puppet accounts and extremist propaganda” that’s not overtly state-backed.