Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (D–Fla.) is drafting legislation—called the Let Parent’s Choose Protection Act, or “Sammy’s Law”—that would require social media platforms to let parents track their children’s activity. The bill is named for Sammy Chapman, a teenager who died after taking fentanyl-laced drugs he purchased over Snapchat. “SAMMY’s Law is designed to enhance the ability […]
In 2018, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his website, Infowars, were banned by YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Apple for violating these platforms’ hate speech policies. Four years later, the largest social media platforms have prevented the promotion of a documentary about him as well. Private companies are well within their rights to make the content moderation […]
Industrial policy is making a comeback. For those of you under the age of 50, this is just another term for corporate welfare—a lovely name for the unlovely practice of a government granting subsidies, protective tariffs, and other privileges to politically influential industries or companies. It’s often done in the name of some lofty goal […]
Amazon recently announced it would seek to acquire boutique health care service provider One Medical. Rather than considering the consumer benefits that may accompany such a transaction, the usual crowd of anti-Amazon, antitrust hipsters rushed to attack this as a problematic entry into yet another industry. These critiques were echoed by some privacy advocates who […]
Americans have different priorities than lawmakers when it comes to tech regulation. People don’t want to see Congress use antitrust law against big tech, according to a new poll from AXIS Research. Tech regulations, in general, are low on people’s list of things the government should prioritize. Only 1 percent of voters surveyed said it […]
Always beware of the name given to a piece of legislation. It rarely describes accurately the likely impact of enacting a bill. In fact, statutes often do the opposite of what their names suggest. Take Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s (D–Minn.) proposed legislation named the American Innovation and Choice Online Act. While everyone likes more choice and […]
Google can’t win when it comes to ads for crisis pregnancy centers. Democrats in Congress have been pressuring Google to “limit the appearance” of ads and websites for these businesses, which exist to persuade pregnant women not to abort and aren’t always truthful about their nonneutral viewpoint or abortion realities. Now, Republicans are threatening to […]
Two months after it first scrapped the Disinformation Governance Board, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) now admits there is “no need” for the board at all. A DHS advisory subcommittee made the declaration on Monday, according to The Washington Post. Previously the board had technically been “paused.” First announced in April, the disinformation board attracted […]
Earlier this month, the respective parents of two girls filed suit against social media platform TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance. According to the suit, the girls died while imitating behavior from videos that TikTok knew were dangerous and should have taken down. It asks for a jury trial and unspecified monetary damages. One of […]
American taxpayers pay to be spied upon. That’s one takeaway from new documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which has been examining how federal agents spent millions to purchase massive troves of cellphone location data and dodge Fourth Amendment requirements. As part of a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), […]