The White House presented six principles for reforming big tech platforms, saying it was heartened by a bipartisan willingness in Congress to rein in US tech giants.
The six principles, dubbed ‘Enhancing Competition and Tech Platform Accountability‘, were revealed on Thursday. The announcement follows Biden administration officials’ meeting with experts to explore the risks of big tech platforms and the need for more accountability. According to the White House, the US should have straightforward rules to guarantee that small and mid-sized businesses can participate in a fair market.
From bill to legislation
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters that the principles result from months of effort and interaction with multiple stakeholders, adding that the government looks forward to hearing from the companies in question.
A bipartisan group of legislators has initiated an antitrust bill focused on the four tech giants: Meta, Apple, Google, and Amazon. The bill aims to prohibit the giants from favoring their own companies in search engine results and other media.
The politicians have stated that they think they have the 60 Senate votes required to proceed, though no vote has been planned at this time.
What the six principles are intended to achieve
Privacy, antitrust, algorithmic bias and other digital policy concerns were discussed during Thursday’s session, which included multiple top White House officials, District of Columbia Attorney General Karl Racine and technology experts.
The six principles were designed to encourage competition in the technology sector, enact strong federal privacy laws and enforce children’s privacy and online security. In addition, they set out to repeal special safeguards for large tech platforms, improve transparency about platforms’ algorithms and content moderation choices, and halt discriminatory algorithmic outcomes.