Ownership

Apparently, Members of Congress have begun scrutinizing Google’s relationship with China’s Huawei Technologies—roping another Silicon Valley giant into Washington’s escalating digital cold war with Beijing. The review—of a facet of Google’s Android operating system partnership with Huawei—comes after lawmakers questioned Facebook about its data partnerships with Huawei and three other Chinese electronics makers. Facebook said it would wind down the Huawei deal by the week’s end.

Legislation to rein in Facebook’s practices — and even stiff penalties from the Federal Trade Commission — are starting to look like a real possibility, even in a Congress typically slow to move on tech issues.  Lawmakers are pointing to two main vehicles emerging in Congress.  One is the Consent Act, a bill sponsored by Sen Ed Markey (D-MA) that would require Facebook and other tech companies such as Google to get explicit permission from users before doing anything with their personal information.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) is arguing that regulators should deal with an explosion of merger and acquisition activity by applying “greater vigilance and vigor” to the exercise of antitrust law.

The CEO of a small wireless carrier that offers consumers an alternative to the major cell phone companies says AT&T refused to run its ads on AT&T's DirecTV service as a way to suppress competition with the telecom giant's own wireless service. AT&T, which is fighting an anti-trust suit brought by the Department of Justice that aims to halt its $85 billion acquisition of Time Warner, now says it's changed the policy that kept Mint Mobile's ads off its pay TV service.

When the government broke up the telephone system in 1984, the fact that AT&T could count most citizens as customers and that it was arguably the best-run telephone company in the world was not deemed compelling enough to preserve its monopoly power. The breakup would unleash a wave of competition and innovation that ultimately benefited consumers and the economy. Facebook seems to be in a similar position today — only with far greater global reach than Ma Bell could have imagined. It is the most powerful communications and media company in the world. And that power is being abused.

Comcast has agreed to pay $155 million in back taxes to Oregon in order to settle a nine-year property tax dispute. Comcast will also drop its attempt to secure a tax break that OR created as part of a failed attempt to bring Google Fiber to the state. Gov Kate Brown (D-OR) announced the settlement with Comcast, noting that the legal battle "likely would have continued for many more years because several distinct and complex legal questions were in dispute." OR accepted the $155 million payment despite previously arguing that Comcast owed $200 million.

Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune (R-SD) and Ranking Member Bill Nelson (D-FL) pressed Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg for answers following a report in the New York Times that Facebook offered numerous mobile device manufacturers special access to private user information.

Britain’s culture secretary said that 21st Century Fox should be allowed to bid for control of the satellite broadcaster Sky -- as long as Fox sells 24-hour news channel Sky News. The news from Britain sets up a potential bidding war with Comcast for a jewel of Europe’s media industry. The decision by the culture secretary, Matt Hancock, ends months of uncertainty over whether the British government would block Rupert Murdoch’s efforts to buy the 61 percent of Sky that his company does not already own.

The Federal Communications Commission’s efforts to block the Chinese company Huawei from US telecommunications contracts and supply chains is unconstitutional, misguided, “arbitrary and capricious,” Huawei said. The Chinese telecom giant devoted more than 100 pages to savaging the FCC proposal, which would deny money from the commission’s Universal Service Fund to companies that purchase equipment or services from companies that are deemed threats to national security. That list would include Huawei and ZTE, another Chinese telecom.

Rep Keith Ellison (D-MN) is calling on the US government to investigate Google, the latest sign that some Democratic lawmakers are ready to challenge the tech industry after befriending it in the past.  In a letter to the Federal Trade Commission, Rep Ellison urged the watchdog agency to take a closer look at Google and its parent company, Alphabet, given that European regulators recently found that the search giant harmed its rivals and fined it $2.7 billion.