The leaders of the world's most powerful technology companies - Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google - will speak to Congress tomorrow, Wednesday, the first time that these leaders have gathered to defend themselves and their companies in front of representatives of the American people.
Power charge to technology sector
Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon are being investigated for antitrust violations. This means that lawmakers are trying to find out if companies have used anti-competitive business practices designed to stifle smaller competitors and maintain market monopoly?
Antitrust laws have a long history in the United States, and have applied to many companies in many sectors such as oil, railways, and finance, but these laws have not been applied to technology companies due to the lack of legislation regulating technical innovations in the past century.
This session is the first leg of an antitrust investigation that Congress has been conducting for more than a year. Young contestants testified before the House Judicial Subcommittee in June, claiming that the Big Four used anti-competitive business practices.
The richest person in the world in front of Congress
This session is the first time that the four CEOs will testify in one session of Congress. It is the first time that Jeff Bezos, the world's richest person - with a net worth of $ 171.6 billion - will testify before Congress. But most importantly, it is one of the first steps towards laying the foundations of antitrust regulation in the technology world.
The hearing also comes as the industry continues to shrink, as a result of the widespread controversy against technology that gained special strength in 2018. Especially on issues such as breach of privacy, abuse of power, and the role these companies can play in influencing policy, which has contributed to increased Hostility to large technology companies.
The blue bird probably won't be in the cage
The session will be attended by CEOs of the strongest US technology companies, with Mark Zuckerberg from Facebook, Sander Pichai from Google, Jeff Bezos from Amazon, and Tim Cook from Apple.
Lawmakers also invited Twitter CEO Jacques Dorsey to attend the hearing in light of the widespread hacking of the site on July 15, which revealed Twitter's poor security architecture, but it is unclear whether Dorsey will attend.
Single charge in multiple forms
Lawmakers are likely to question Google about its iron grip on the advertising and search market, while Apple is being investigated over allegations that it gives its own apps a premium treatment compared to third-party apps in its app store.
Facebook is in the spotlight for acquisitions made in recent years by potential competitors, namely WhatsApp, Instagram and Giphy, and Amazon will be investigated to see if it has promoted its brands - before sellers - via third parties. Three.
Representatives of the House of Representatives involved in the antitrust investigation chose to question the four chief executives together. But according to protocol reports, this would not have been effective if they had witnessed separately, which would have allowed legislators to assign their questions more specifically to each company rather than conduct a thorough investigation.
Technical grill
Lawmakers take turns embarrassing executives with questions that may be repeated for a number of them. Executives ’answers will reveal many of the hidden aspects of their business, and CEOs will in turn try to defend their companies over their competition violations.
This is the first time that the four CEOs appear together in an antitrust hearing, but it is not the first time that an antitrust investigation has dominated the tech world.
In the late nineties, Microsoft was subjected to the issue of antitrust, when when Seattle began to gain hegemony in the Internet market, a federal judge ruled that the company was actually a violation, and Microsoft reached a settlement with the government in 2001, but the case entered history as the most prominent example of the impact that Antitrust laws can bring about technology.
The hearing is not a trial to be judged by, and instead lawmakers should question technology experts and gather evidence through their testimonies, which can enrich the ongoing investigation of the subcommittee, but a broader investigation could ultimately lead to legislation designed to prevent tech companies from growing significantly And very sturdy.
The session is scheduled to take place in Washington, in the Rayburn House office building in the capital, tomorrow, Wednesday, July 29 at 4 pm, and it will be broadcast live on the Judicial Committee of the House of Representatives channel on YouTube.
According to the court notice, legislators and witnesses are allowed to attend through the video conference. Sources told Reuters that the four CEOs would do that as well, so you might not see them in the courtroom.