Incredibly, the Internet giants – from Google to Facebook, from Apple to Amazon and Microsoft – are now more afraid of the ax of Margrethe Vestager, the very strict European Commissioner for Antitrust, than the new president of the United States, who will probably be Joe Biden. It is the trend of the American vote that has turned things around in a few days. Big Tech feared a Democratic victory in the US presidential election because Biden had announced that he was preparing to crack down on Silicon Valley and the overly powerful Internet giants. But a president will come out of the polls who, although a Democrat, appears like a crippled president because, in any case, he will not have full control of Parliament where the presence of Republicans inspired by Donald Trump will remain very strong and such as to prevent the Democrats from implementation of the most radical programs.
Conversely, the European Union - as Mf writes today - is preparing a very strong squeeze to curb the economic and informational dominance of Big Tech and on 2 December next, the European Commission will launch the Digital Service Act, i.e. a set of rules in favor of competition and consumers on the European digital market which will enter into force as early as 2021. Perhaps the break up, the dreaded stew of the Internet giants, will not come, because such an explosive measure would risk fueling the trade war between America and the Old continent, but Google, Amazon, Facebook and the other big digital companies fear that it will come close, also because the Member States will be given the opportunity to do so.
Even if the stew does not arrive, the digital giants will be forced for the first time to reveal their algorithms and to open their platforms to competition and that is why they are trying to deploy all lobbying weapons to curb Vestager and the European Commission which for now is keeping the course and is also thinking of creating a board to guarantee technical assistance and coordination of the various national Authorities and to launch an asymmetrical discipline that favors the rivals of the digital giants.
