Tech Giants Amazon, Apple, Facebook & Google Testify Before Antitrust Subcommittee In US | 5 Things To Know

Big tech companies Apple, Google, Facebook, and Amazon had to face the antitrust subcommittee and answer direct questions about how they handle data. Here are 5 things that happened at the hearing.

New Delhi: “Online Platforms and Market Power” virtual antitrust hearing felt like a face-off meeting between the US government and tech giants Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google which happened on July 29^th, where the CEOs Jeff Bezos, Tim Cook, Mark Zuckerberg, and Sundar Pichai testified before the House Judiciary antitrust subcommittee. The antitrust hearing was originally scheduled for Monday. Here are some of the key takeaways from the hearing.

• The committee is said to have conducted a year-long investigation of these big tech companies to find that these companies have been come so powerful that they disrupt the country’s democracy and crush any competition hence creating a monopoly.
• The panel consisted of members from both Republican and Democrat parties who questioned the CEOs on matters such as privacy policies, stealing from young upstarts, meddling with US elections, and more.
• Mark Zuckerberg the founder of social media Facebook was questioned whether his company duplicated various apps to use to as his negotiations when trying to buy various other companies. Rep. Pramila Jaypal brought internal emails which showed that Zuckerberg copied Instagram to create a camera app to push the creator of Instagram to buy off the app.
• Jeff Bezos the founder of Amazon was accused of selling stolen and counterfeit products on the platform. He was also questioned whether Amazon would string along small companies only to recreate the same items and later destroy the small business by selling Amazon copies for a much lower price range.
• Tim Cook the CEO of Apple was questioned about 30 percent commission it charged developers for putting the apps on the Apple Store, to which only said that the commission was really less and hasn’t ever increased the commission rate ever since Apple Store launched.
• Sundar Pichai CEO of Google was questioned whether the platform meddled with the 2016 election and was whether it was likely to meddle with the upcoming election in favour of Joe Biden. To which Sundar Pichai struggled to give a straight answer. Google was also accused of stealing and only showcasing search results from platforms under Google.

After the 4-hour long hearing ended, committee said it will be publishing the problems and suggest solutions to it at a later date. The date hasn’t been specified.