Big Tech is a group of the largest technology and software development companies with a huge impact on the Internet. The activities of the tech platforms create an environment that is conducive to the maintenance of connectivity, the emergence of new ideas, and the marketing of new products and services. However, they also entail certain threats due to their dominant position in cyberspace.
The White House is aware of the risks arising from the continuous growth and development of Big Tech, for example: the impact of anti-competitive conduct by large platforms on small and medium-sized businesses, restrictions that large platforms place on their operation and potential innovation, concerns about the accumulation of significant volumes of users’ personal data, or threats related to the use of social media by young people.
Bearing in mind the need to increase the accountability of tech platforms for their actions, the White House set out the following six principles of the Big Tech reform:
- Promoting competition in the technology sector. Legislation needs to be passed to ensure that small and medium-sized businesses can compete on a level playing field with the dominant businesses.
- Federal level legislation needs to be passed to protect Americans’ privacy. Clear restrictions need to be imposed on tech platforms’ ability to collect, use, transfer, and store users’ personal data, including limits on targeted advertising. In particular, strong protections for sensitive information such as geolocation and health information are needed.
- Strong privacy and online protections for children. The safety and well-being of young people should be the top priority of platforms and other interactive digital service providers when designing products, including by restricting excessive data collection and targeted advertising to young people. Profit and revenue should be a secondary concern in relation to the primary goal, that is the need to protect the privacy of children.
- A fundamental reform of the privileged status of large tech platforms, which shields them from liability, even when they disseminate illegal or violent conduct or materials.
- Increased transparency about platform’s algorithms and decisions regarding content moderation. That will increase the transparency about the content displayed to a given user, and when and how the content is removed from the sites.
- Stopping discriminatory decisions made using algorithms. There is a need for strong protection to ensure that algorithms do not discriminate against protected groups.
The full communication from the White House is available here.