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US Lawmakers Warn Biden To Probe EU Targeting of Tech Firms (yahoo.com) 89

Posted by msmash from the watching-the-watchdog dept.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers has written to U.S. President Joe Biden, warning European technology regulation are unfairly targeting U.S. companies and not including many Chinese or EU firms, according to a letter seen by Reuters on Monday. From the report: Under the European Union's Digital Markets Act (DMA), five major U.S. tech companies -- Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta and Microsoft -- were designated "gatekeeper" service providers. From March 2024, these companies -- as well as TikTok's Chinese owner ByteDance -- will be required to make their messaging apps work with rivals and let users choose which ones they want pre-installed on their devices.

In a letter seen by Reuters, 21 members of the U.S. House of Representatives warned the new rules could damage American economic and security interests and called on Biden to secure commitments from the EU the rules will be enforced fairly. "Securing our leadership in this sector is imperative for our economy and American workers," the letter said. "The designation of leading U.S. companies as 'gatekeepers' threatens to upend the U.S. economy, diminish our global leadership in the digital sphere, and jeopardize the security of consumers."

The letter questioned why Chinese companies Alibaba, Huawei, and Tencent had avoided designation and why European companies had avoided any scrutiny. "The EU inexplicably failed to designate any European retailers, content-sharing platforms, payment firms, and telcos," it said. Signatories of the letter -- including Representative Lou Correa, a Democrat, and Thomas Massie, a Republican, -- called on Biden to seek assurances from EU lawmakers the DMA will not be unfairly used to target U.S. companies.
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US Lawmakers Warn Biden To Probe EU Targeting of Tech Firms More

US Lawmakers Warn Biden To Probe EU Targeting of Tech Firms

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  • What cheek these silly Europeans have! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Monday December 18, 2023 @12:21PM (#64089291)

    How DARE they think they could just issue laws as they please in their jurisdiction! Don't they know who we are?

    • How DARE they think they could just issue laws as they please in their jurisdiction! Don't they know who we are?

      We have always been at war with Eurasia.

    • How DARE they think they could just issue laws as they please in their jurisdiction! Don't they know who we are?

      A civilized country would start with the question, "Why are they making these decisions in the EU?" If, after an investigation, it's found that there were reasons, examine those reasons and see if you agree.

      Based on the rhetoric about cracking down on big tech we've seen amongst those creatures that inhabit the far-off land designated D.C? I'm guessing somebody's panties are tightly wadded over the fact somebody else got there first. Our poor widdle tech-billionaires are being reigned in my the wrong reign

    • Re:What cheek these silly Europeans have! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by larryjoe ( 135075 ) on Monday December 18, 2023 @01:26PM (#64089461)

      How DARE they think they could just issue laws as they please in their jurisdiction! Don't they know who we are?

      Americans, including US lawmakers, all believe that Europe can enact whatever laws and rules it wishes and that it can do so unilaterally. However, obviously it cannot mandate that there are no retaliatory reactions. That is the nature of trade. If the Europeans think that they can provide competitive advantages to their own companies, they should do so. The Americans would do exactly the same thing. However, these types of actions usually trigger responses, both bilateral and via global trade agreements and alliances.

      So, the European actions are reasonable from their perspective, and the American response is also reasonable from a US perspective.

      • Re:What cheek these silly Europeans have! (Score:5, Informative)

        by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Monday December 18, 2023 @02:26PM (#64089627)

        What own companies? All the EU wants is for all tech companies to play by the rules that they design, and that means, among other things, that irresponsible spying on their citizens and stripping them off any privacy they may still have is not ok, along with causing havoc by spreading unfounded rumors and blatant misinformation.

        Yes, we do actually consider this a bad thing.

        • What own companies? All the EU wants is for all tech companies to play by the rules that they design, and that means, among other things, that irresponsible spying on their citizens and stripping them off any privacy they may still have is not ok, along with causing havoc by spreading unfounded rumors and blatant misinformation. Yes, we do actually consider this a bad thing.
          Bitch please, google or use your preferred search engine the phrase "14 eyes", then get back to me. This is about SAP and other euro

      • Seeing a moderate response like this actually getting modded up is likely to be the highlight of my holidays. I would have expected the now-ubiquitous "Troll" mode and 10 paragraphs of vitriol.

      • So, the European actions are reasonable from their perspective, and the American response is also reasonable from a US perspective.

        The European response is only reasonable if you assume a complete lack of respect for profits for foreign companies.

        The American response is only reasonable if you assume a complete lack of respect for the laws of Europe.

        America is okay with enslaving its children for profit (shall I pull up any of the numerous articles discussing how judges and companies continuously throw children of poor families into prisons?).

        I can understand why Europeans would not choose to have the same values that America has. I to

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by DarkOx ( 621550 )

      Exactly the EU needs to be told in unmistakable terms, they are vassal state that exists under the US peace umbrella. Failure to abide by our economic interest, means no more NATO.

    • Re:What cheek these silly Europeans have! (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 18, 2023 @02:10PM (#64089575)

      ... why European companies had avoided any scrutiny. "The EU inexplicably failed to designate any European retailers, content-sharing platforms, payment firms, and telcos," it said.

      Name a European tech company equivalent to Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, et.al.
      Seriously. Name one. Go ahead, I'll wait.

      This is a combination of 2 things:
      -- The entire tech field is dominated by U.S. companies
      -- The U.S. government has failed to enforce anti-trust laws. They have allowed these companies to buy up all of their competitors and completely eliminate competition.

      • Exactly. US is far and away the leader (and probably because of lax laws in the US.) Not a hard concept to grasp.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Calydor ( 739835 )

        The closest that springs to mind would be Nokia of 20-25 years ago, and even that is quite a stretch.

      • Why should I name one? You pretty much summed up the problem here. The US dropped the ball and let their corporations run the country, and now those corporations complain that someone else wants to fix the mess and want the government they paid for to do their dirty work.

        • Nothing is stopping a group of Europeans from starting their own tech company and competing for Europeans to use their platform over the American platforms.

          Following EU laws for US tech companies is just the cost of doing business. Same as when our companies do things in China to appease that government, it's for the money.

          If Europe was that up in arms over American tech, they'd pass more laws or invest into European tech companies.

          From this side of the pond, it sounds like it's really hard to start a tech

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by 0xG ( 712423 )

        Spotify?

    • It's not nations or the EU passing and enforcing laws in their own jurisdictions that are the problem. It's the habit they've picked up of exporting and enforcing their laws outside their own jurisdiction. If Spain or France want to censor what people can find on google.es or google.fr, fine (Well, not really fine... it's contemptible, in fact. But that's a battle for the citizens of France and Spain.). If I move to a EU nation and start a business, it is absolutely and entirely appropiate that my busin

    • If the Europeans are cheeky, I hold the Americans doing the probing are wearing rubber gloves. /sarcasm

    • There is a fair bit of "targeting" going on right here amongst ourselves IMHO.

  • The vast majority of the stuff we do electronically comes from America. As such we check what the Americans are doing with the electronic stuff we use.

  • Like universal USB-C for cell phones, enforced federation helps USA consumers also.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by oic0 ( 1864384 )
      Its good when they make them have better practices, its wrong when they decide to fine them for past behavior they've now decided is unacceptable.

    • Like universal USB-C for cell phones, enforced federation helps USA consumers also.

      The US customers might argue that its stifling Apples amazing and brilliant innovation...

      • Like universal USB-C for cell phones, enforced federation helps USA consumers also.

        The US customers might argue that its stifling Apples amazing and brilliant innovation...

        Only Apple customers might think delusional things like that. Perhaps you meant US companies?

        • If Apple finds the regulatory environment to hostile, they could always stop doing business in Europe. Hard to see that happening, so it must be within the range of profitability for Apple to continue offering EU products and services.

    • There's not much to be happy about with the USB-C rule. We moved quickly through proprietary chargers, micro, mini, C, each being an improvement over what came before. In 20 years we will still be on USB-C, because now it is much harder to push the envelope. And for what? USB-C was already a de-facto standard. Sure the hipsters buying Apple products had to deal with a different charger but that's a service to them, they pay extra to be different.

      The thing with that stupid rule is that, if we're lucky, in 20

  • I'm glad that you is doing something about it I wish the US would do more the tech companies as far as regulation goes. They are money making organisms that have grown out of control with issues like privacy and power. I wish the US would start fine their own companies and enacting laws.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Businesses are artificially created Daemons that blindly chase profit and growth largely without regard for the larger world of people at home trying to live a life.
        Properly harnessed it's a source to tap to support people.

        Business left to its own ceases to serve and becomes a black hole sucking up everything and leaving nothing for the people.

        If you are to keep deamons it's best to keep them in a bottle and only summon them under very controlled circumstances by which to tap their power.

        I fail to understand what device and executive monitors have got to do with this.

    • The USA hasn't functioned properly for decades and it just goes to show the ignorance of these politicians that they lack the staffing to do anything more than listen to corporate lobbyists to the point they even got some Democrats to fall in line! This is still a largely Republican created problem as they were the 1st party to become completely corrupt: You see since the 90s, they've purposely cut funding to BOTH SIDES for neutral support staff which empowers lobbyists and keeps leaders in the dark and t

      • You don't know me, I don't know why you would make WAG guesses about people you don't know. Your behavior is impolite at best.

  • These lawmakers are idiots (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday December 18, 2023 @01:47PM (#64089531)

    The reason why US tech firms are targeted is because they essentially have a monopoly over things in the EU. Tiktok that also has a huge market share was targeted as well.

  • I mean this is silly and hyper biased.. (Score:3)

    by dstwins ( 167742 ) on Monday December 18, 2023 @02:28PM (#64089635) Homepage
    the EU hasn't targetted a lot of chinese companies because none of them have the sheer scope/breadth and influence other firms have on the daily lives of their citizens.. (ALL their citizens).

    Tencent (aka: QQ/WeChat and their gaming platforms (Riot Games, Clash of Clans/Supercell, and Funcom) is the defacto platform WITHIN china, but outside its a super tiny amount.. pretty much limited to mostly mostly the Chinese community in terms of influence.. (Yes, they own minority stakes in other firms like EA, Gamestop, Snapchat, Spotify, Tesla and a major stake in Epic Games but again, these firms don't have CONTROL over people's lives in the same way Apple, or Google, or other firms do)

    Huawei is a 5G platform and cell phone provider.. but as Huawei has been essentially displaced with Nokia and again, outside of China, the #1 and #2 android phones being used are Samsung and Google.. (if we leave off Android, then iPhones by sales volume the #1.. hence the concern about Apple and their "walled garden" structure).

    Alibaba has their fingers in lots of pies but the also provide Datacenter/Cloud Server services.. but in terms of DC/Cloud space, they are a distant #50.. AWS/Google/Microsoft are the defacto owners of that space globally.. (and pretty much in that order).

    So trying to lay this as "why not chinese companies" and crying foul shows how incredibly stupid this is.. The chinese companies have almost no control over the masses, are WAY down the list of impacting/interacting/influencing people's lives..

    We don't say lets "Baidu" that term (ie: search).. people say "Google" it.. Facebook is so prevalent that almost every website on the planet interfaces with them (and google) for authentication (OATH). Hell, both google and apple (as well as microsoft) set the freak'n standards almost every website/browser uses.. If google tomorrow wanted to nix the letter X in websites, given their size and influence, they could do it.. Sure, they would catch hell for it.. but given the size they have.. most sites would capitulate.. which would cause others to abide if nothing else because "most" are doing it). Hell, even entering the US, they want to know your facebook username/account and gmail account.. they don't even look at all the other services one can do.. The phone to get is Apple with their tight integration of services (so much so that Apple's been sued by everyone because of their controls and limiting 3rd party access by many firms/countries). So yes.. the EU is correct, those firms are for all practical purposes.. gatekeepers to technology/information.. Not that Apple/Google/Facebook would (that we know of) but if they wanted to block content or exhert obvious control over media/content.. it would practically derail the world.. it wouldn't stop things because there are other avenues of access.. but that's like if you blocked 4 major highways into/out of a highway.. while it would stop everything.. for all practical purposes.. travel would stop because the side roads don't go the same places/don't go the same speed/not build to deal with the volume of traffic the highways deal with).. and as such they should be taxed accordingly.. (the purposes of a tax is not so much money extraction though it has that effect, but rather to encourage/discourage specific behaviour.. The EU doesn't have the same monopoly laws that the US has.. but it can tax firms that have almost the same power/control)
  • The US reputation for shooting from the hip and figuring out consequences later is not as popular in Europe as folks might think. Having worked across the EU, US and Asia, I find that US companies tend to have the least regard for the impact of business decisions on their own employees or customers.
    In the area of tech, things like right to repair, open source mandates for government facing technology, enforcement of open standards etc. are considered important in the EU, because they are better for the pe
  • EU and UK regulators just put the kibosh on Adobe killing and eating rival software Figma. A victory for designers everywhere. What these US tech companies are really saying is that they have not been successful in buying off the Europeans.
  • One could rejoice about payback time, since USA used unfair litigation against UE businesses for years. But I bet EU will carve out.
  • tell the EU that the USA will pull out of NATO and revoke funding of any kind, and the EU will shut up and play nice, (they just need an attitude adjustment)

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