Biden’s call to “unite against tech abuses” sounds familiar
President Biden published an op-ed yesterday in the Wall Street Journal putting Big Tech on notice that his administration was working — in fact, has been working — to rein in its worst abuses. These “broad principles” for reform sound familiar.
The op-ed starts by thanking tech for their hard work (and contributions towards the GDP), and then immediately deplores its treatment of children and other vulnerable people.
“I’m concerned about how some in the industry collect, share and exploit our most personal data, deepen extremism and polarization in our country, tilt our economy’s playing field, violate the civil rights of women and minorities, and even put our children at risk,” writes the President.
He mentions three areas in which the federal government should intervene: competition, algorithmic liability, and privacy.
He is concerned that companies might “collect use and share highly private data,” especially for ad targeting. He claims that the White House “developing new privacy standards for commercial data.” Good! Good! calling for federal rules for years — sure, it was because they didn’t like California’s, but they’ve definitely been asking for it. The time to establish these was a long, long time ago — they take forever to figure out and then lead to dozens of court cases that define their finer contours, as we’ve seen in the European Union’s GDPR efforts.
Privacy bills are like all other things. They fall prey to partisan politics, and it seems unlikely that this will change. We are getting a glimpse of the challenges ahead with the privacy bills. California Consumer Protection Act and other state-led efforts. The FTC could also be preparing to make its mark.
Tech must also take responsibility for what they share and how they use it. Section 230 is the topic he proposes to reform. It’s a can of worms everybody has had for years, but no one wants to open. Too much and the sector will fail under the weight of all the lawsuits. It is easier to complain than to try to fix it. Transparency with algorithms can be easier, especially when it is connected to AI-related policy or questions of protected classes or categories.
The last is the need for “bringing competition back into the tech sector.” This is why Biden clearly relies on Lina Khan, FTC Chairwoman and arch-enemy, to win. Amazon, MetaNow, and all the time Microsoft.
Biden wrote, “We recently secured an important funding boost for our Antitrust enforcers.” Khan and others complain that the FTC lacks the authority, funding, and headcount (not only because of some administrations), to fight industry giants who buy up competitors like they are nothing. Biden could achieve his goals by setting up an antitrust team with a different antitrust philosophy (ask Khan).
This is not the first time that someone has complained about Facebook buying Instagram and WhatsApp. Systemic advantages awarded to those who can afford to lobby the government have allowed all this to happen — don’t forget that many of the “great American companies… smothered by the dominant incumbents” came and went while Biden was Vice President or Senator. We’ve all heard the chorus before. Next, what’s next? It is almost always nothing.
Although Biden’s opinion piece does not contribute to the discussion about tech’s excesses or potential solutions, it is not meant to. It is instead a public declaration of Biden’s (grudgingly) opposition to the problems in the tech industry. He seems to be saying that “you brought this on yourself, my dear friends.” This legislative session may be filled with the long-promised, promised nips and needles tech has so desperately sought and requested. As he noted in the last paragraph, unfortunately:
He wrote that while there will be many policy issues on which we don’t agree in the new Congress… let us unite behind our common values” for tech-reform. You are very welcome, Mr. President. It will be a great time.