Advocates Call Out Big Tech’s False Choice Gambit, Attempts to Deceive Lawmakers
WASHINGTON, D.C. – It’s up to lawmakers and the voters to decide how to rein in Big Tech giants, not the companies themselves, Public Citizen and more than 25 groups said in a letter sent today to the Democratic leadership in Congress. The letter calls on leaders to “reject the notion that Congress must choose between antitrust and privacy reforms, when the public is demanding broader action.”
“Recent remarks by Big Tech corporate leadership and its advocates have presented Congress with a false choice: fix corporate concentration or fix privacy. There is no reason that Congress should be so limited,” the letter states. “Big Tech cannot, and should not, choose how it will be held accountable in a time when its damaging effects are becoming clearer by the day. Only elected officials, empowered by their constituents, should decide the policy solutions to the persistent problems in American’s digital lives – not the corporations responsible for those problems.”
In the face of legislation on multiple fronts that threatens their profits-over-people business model, Big Tech has settled on a strategy of division and confusion, even mischaracterizing their own opinion polls. A tech funded lobbying outfit, Taxpayers Protection Alliance, recently was forced to correct its own press release by omitting its own paid-for polling results, which found strong public support across the country for both privacy and antitrust legislation.
The public interest community is calling out this deceptive gambit and urging Congress to move forward on all legislation protecting the public from Big Tech abuses.