By Brian Fung, CNN
Updated 6:01 PM EST, Thu February 1, 2024

WashingtonCNN —

Wednesday’s emotional Senate Judiciary Committee hearing grilling tech CEOs focused on Silicon Valley’s failures to protect kids online. But it also spotlighted Congress’ own glaring — and longstanding — inability to pass any meaningful legislation to rein in tech platforms.

According to more than a half-dozen front-line participants in the battle to regulate tech, the gridlock boils down to three main factors: Lobbying and partisanship, genuine disagreements over hugely consequential questions about the future of privacy and free speech, and who technology is meant to serve in the first place.

Big Tech has become a bipartisan punching bag on Capitol Hill. But US lawmakers have sat by while consumer advocates, whistleblowers and state attorneys general have amassed troves of evidence suggesting tech giants may have endangered users’ health or monopolized key sectors of the economy.

Lobbying and influence

Tech companies spend millions in Washington to get their way. This has been true since the early 2010s, when tech companies began realizing the benefits of influencing policymakers on issues including net neutrality and privacy.

As with other industries, Big Tech’s influence machine involves campaign contributions to members of Congress, as well as the hiring of registered lobbyists to gain exclusive access to lawmakers. But it also includes a wide and sophisticated network of think tanks, advocacy groups and trade associations that are now a basic feature of the legislative process.

“They use the same playbook that the tobacco companies used, that the fossil-fuel industry has used,” said Danny Weiss, chief advocacy officer at Common Sense Media, a consumer advocacy group. “So that’s all real and that’s definitely formidable.”

Lobbying is not inherently bad in a democracy that gives everyone a voice, advocates on both sides say. But the tech industry’s deep pockets give it a distinct advantage.

Sometimes, differences between tech companies can create openings to sow chaos.

This week, Microsoft announced its support for the Kids Online Safety Act, a leading social media bill. But Microsoft has only a small stake in social media with its ownership of LinkedIn, so its commitment stands to make life far more difficult for rivals such as Google, which owns YouTube, while minimizing the impact to itself.

Source:
https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/01/tech/social-media-regulation-bipartisan-support/index.html