Tony Romm

The House Antitrust Subcommittee investigation into Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google entered a new phase Sept 13, after lawmakers called on each of the tech giants to turn over a trove of sensitive documents, including top executives’ private communications. The requests sent by Democratic and Republican Reps ask the companies to share detailed information about their internal operations, including financial data about their products and services, private discussions about potential merger targets and records related to “any prior investigation” they have faced on competition grounds.

Attorneys general for 50 US states and territories officially announced an antitrust investigation of Google (CA and AL are the only states that have not signed onto the probe), embarking on a wide-ranging review of a tech giant that the officials said may threaten competition, consumers and the continued growth of the web.

Adopted in 2018, the California Consumer Privacy Act grants Web users the right to see the personal information that companies collect about them and stop it from being sold. The law applies only to CA residents, but its backers hope it might someday spur regulators around the country to follow suit — and force the tech giants to change their practices nationwide. But powerful business organizations — representing retailers, marketers and tech giants — have responded by seeking sweeping revisions to the law before it goes into effect.

The Department of Justice is forging ahead with its review of online platforms for potential antitrust violations, coordinating with state attorneys general while signaling it could send demands for documents to Silicon Valley companies and their critics, said DOJ antitrust chief Makan Delrahim. Assistant Attorney General Delrahim also waded into a simmering Washington debate over what legal protections should be afforded to Facebook, Google and Twitter for the user-generated content that appears on their platforms, raising the possibility that Congress could re-examine the law.

Facebook unveiled its long-awaited feature allowing users to limit businesses, apps, and other groups that collect data about them on the Web and pass that information to the tech giant — a move that may disappoint people who thought they would be able to delete that information from Facebook in full. The social media giant said the new tools to control “Off-Facebook Activity” are designed to “shed more light” on a form of online tracking — around shopping habits, web-browsing histories and other activities — that determines some of the ads people see on Facebook.

Top officials in the Trump administration expressed interest in tools that might anticipate mass shootings or predict attackers by scanning social media posts, photos and videos during a meeting with online platforms including Facebook, Google and Twitter. The technology could serve as an early-warning system for potential attacks, White House officials proposed at the brainstorming session, perhaps compiling information from across social sites to identify deadly incidents before they occur, according to three people familiar with the matter but not authorized to discuss a private gatherin

The White House will host top tech companies to discuss the rise of violent online extremism on Aug 9, marking the Trump administration’s first major engagement on the issue days after a mass shooting in TX left 22 people dead. The gathering will include “senior administration officials along with representatives of a range of companies,” said White House spokesman Judd Deere. He did not name which companies would attend.

Apparently, the Federal Trade Commission plans to allege that Facebook misled users’ about its handling of their phone numbers as part of a wide-ranging complaint that accompanies a settlement ending the government’s privacy probe. In the complaint, which has not yet been released, federal regulators take issue with Facebook’s earlier implementation of a security feature called two-factor authentication. It allows users to request one-time password, sent by text message, each time they log onto the social-networking site.

The package of penalties for Facebook’s past privacy scandals includes a record-breaking $5 billion fine and unprecedented government oversight of its business practices. But a review of the 16-month investigation — described by 10 people familiar with the matter — shows that the Federal Trade Commission stopped short of some even tougher punishments it initially had in mind. Those included fining Facebook not just $5 billion, but tens of billions of dollars, and imposing more direct liability for the company’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg.

Apparently, the Federal Trade Commission has finalized a settlement with Google in its investigation into YouTube for violating federal data privacy laws for children. The settlement — backed by the agency’s three Republicans and opposed by its two Democrats — finds that Google inadequately protected kids who used its video-streaming service and improperly collected their data in breach of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, or COPPA, which prohibits the tracking and targeting of users younger than 13, the people said.