Tag: Big Tech

Ohio Attorney General Sues to Make Google a Public Utility

Cooper Moran

A lawsuit filed on Tuesday by Ohio Attorney General David Yost aims to make Google a public utility, limiting the ways the search engine provides search results.

“Google uses its dominance of internet search to steer Ohioans to Google’s own products–that’s discriminatory and anti-competitive,” Yost said in a statement announcing the lawsuit. “When you own the railroad or the electric company or the cellphone tower, you have to treat everyone the same and give everybody access.”

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Commentary: Florida Governor DeSantis Strikes Back Against Big Tech Censorship

Admin
Person holding phone up in Times Square.

After months of aggressively censoring what it called “COVID-19 misinformation,” Facebook recently announced that it would no longer block user posts claiming that the coronavirus was “man-made” or “manufactured.” That’s because those posts, which typically referenced the work of scientists who supported the idea of a possible coronavirus “lab leak” from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, now appear to have been credible.

This entire episode should be extremely embarrassing for Facebook, a company so confident it has cornered the market on “truth” that it has made it their prerogative to “fact-check” individual user posts, banning anything that fails to comport with Silicon Valley’s extreme left-wing view of reality. Last year, Facebook banned an ad from the American Principles Project PAC claiming Joe Biden and the Democrats would destroy girls’ sports by supporting policies that allowed boys who identify as transgender to compete against girls.

Facebook said the ad was “missing context,” and so our PAC wasn’t allowed to communicate with voters. On Joe Biden’s first day as president, he signed an executive order specifically allowing these boys to compete in girls’ sports.

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Big Tech Lobbyists Sue DeSantis over New Regulations

Peter D'Abrosca
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis

A pair of Big Tech lobbying groups, NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association, have filed a lawsuit against Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody, along with Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and other state officials, after DeSantis signed into law a bill that regulates Big Tech’s censorship abilities earlier this week. 

“Americans everywhere should oppose Florida’s attempt to run roughshod over the First Amendment rights of private online businesses,” Carl Szabo, vice president and general counsel of NetChoice said, according to POLITICO. “By weakening the First Amendment rights of some, Florida weakens the First Amendment rights of all.”

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Commentary: Big Tech Censorship Is Here to Stay

Admin

Big Tech has betrayed the American people yet again – despite hopes that Facebook would finally reverse it’s ban on Donald Trump’s account, the social media giant has re-committed to a path of dangerous partisan censorship.

On Wednesday, an oversight board established by Facebook ruled that it would not be overturning the platform’s January decision to suspend Donald Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts.

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Republicans Debate Breaking up Big Tech After Trump’s Facebook Suspension

The Center Square
Smart phone with Facebook etched out

Many Republicans in Congress have reignited their calls to break up the big tech companies after Facebook announced last week they would maintain the suspension of former President Donald Trump’s account.

A new poll released by Rasmussen Friday found that 59% of likely voters “believe operators of social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter are politically biased in the decisions they make” with only 26% disagreeing. The rest are unsure.

The poll results went on to say that “a majority of voters now favor ending legal protections for social media companies.” The reported public opinion against the tech giants comes the same week Facebook announced they would keep Trump suspended from their platform, citing his alleged role in the Jan. 6 Capitol riots.

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Klobuchar Praises Trump Facebook Ban on NBC

Peter D'Abrosca
Amy Klobuchar

A Democrat senator from Minnesota sided with Facebook, a multi-billion dollar international corporation, in its decision to ban former President Donald J. Trump from its platform for life. 

“That was the right thing to do. He’s the disinformer-in-chief. He told the biggest lie of all time, which led to an insurrection by getting his followers to believe that the election was a fake,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) said on “Late Night” with Seth Meyers. “It was an outrageous moment with a number of Republicans calling him out on it at the time.”

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‘Enemy of Free Speech:’ Republicans Hit Back at Facebook After It Upholds Trump Ban

Peter D'Abrosca
Censorship

Republicans are hitting back at Facebook and the Big Tech giants in Silicon Valley after Facebook’s Oversight Board announced Wednesday that it will uphold its ban of Former President Donald J. Trump.

Facebook claimed in a statement that Trump post “violated Facebook’s rules prohibiting praise or support of people engaged in violence,” when he called Capitol protestors “great patriots” and and “very special” on Jan. 6. 

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Commentary: Use Twitter’s New Weakness to Start Upending Big Tech

RealClearWire
Person holding phone up with Twitter sign up page on smart phone.

Twitter’s stock fell 15 percent last week apparently because they’re not getting sufficient numbers of new users to please the market. People are not as intrigued as they used to be with an allegedly open social media platform that’s not really open, in fact is something of a dictatorship.

I know you’re not supposed to kick someone when they’re down. But when that someone has been acting in the most unAmerican, peremptory ways for years, as if the Bill of Rights never existed, censoring people without explanation—even a former president—blocking free discussion of medical science, for Heaven’s sake, and treating conservatives and libertarians pretty much the way Ferdinand and Isabella treated the Jews before they finally kicked them out of Spain, it’s time to take action.

And, when that “down” is the first chink in the armor of Big Tech that has dominated discourse in this country and around the world to a degree never thought possible, it is all the more urgent to let that foot fly and jump up and down on top a little as well if necessary.

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Florida Senate Passes Elections Bill, Restrictions on Social Media Platforms

Casey Owens

On Monday, April 26th, 2021, the Florida Senate voted 23 to 17 in favor of of a controversial bill (SB 90) regarding election administration and its tightening grip on mail-in voting. SB 90 includes changes to the current Election Code like, supervising and reducing the number of mail-in ballot drop boxes used by a supervisor of elections, and requiring voters to submit an application for a mail-in ballot every two years rather than every four years. 

 Democrats in the Florida Senate who voted against the bill say that SB 90 retains voting restrictions that that are unnecessary and will have disproportionate negative effect on Hispanic, Black, and older voters. They also commented on how the proposed measures of the bill is in reaction to the voting fraud allegations made by former President Trump in the 2020 elections. 

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Facebook Bans Story About BLM Co-Founder Buying Expensive Real Estate

Peter D'Abrosca
Patrisse Khan-Cullors

In the latest example of Silicon Valley censorship, Facebook has banned the sharing of a story about a high-profile Black Lives Matter member purchasing expensive real estate.

“Patrisse Khan-Cullors, the leader of Black Lives Matter and a self-described Marxist, recently purchased a $1.4 million home in an exclusive Los Angeles neighborhood where the vast majority of residents are white, according to reports,” The New York Post originally reported last weekend. 

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Senator Josh Hawley Introduces Antitrust Legislation Aimed at Big Tech

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Joh Hawley

Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) introduced a new bill on Monday that would break up several large companies in the United States, with a particular focus on the Big Tech companies, as reported by the Daily Caller.

The bill is called the “Trust-Busting for the Twenty-First Century Act,” and aims to combat “anti-competitive big business” such as “Big Banks, Big Telecom, and Big Pharma.” In his press release announcing the new legislation, Hawley said that “a small group of woke mega-corporations control the products Americans can buy, the information Americans can receive, and the speech Americans can engage in.”

“These monopoly powers control our speech, our economy, our country,” Hawley continued, “and their control has only grown because Washington has aided and abetted their quest for endless power.”

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General Assembly Considering ‘Tennessee Election Integrity Act’ to Regulate Outside Funding for Election Officials, Require Official Watermarking for Absentee Ballots

Corinne Murdock

Big Tech and Corporate America may face more difficulty funding the elections process under the “Tennessee Election Integrity Act.” In part, the act would require funding from nongovernmental entities to be approved by the Tennessee General Assembly if in session, or the Governor, House and Senate Speaker, Secretary of State, Comptroller of Treasury, and the General Assembly Treasurer. Additionally, an amendment to the act announced on Tuesday would make it more difficult to produce fraudulent absentee ballots.

In short, the amendment to the bill would require non-electronic absentee ballots to be watermarked by local election commissions. That way, county election officials could verify the validity of the ballots upon receipt. Ballots without the watermark would be discarded.

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TikTok Permanently Blacklists PragerU

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Prager University, founded by radio host Dennis Prager, has been permanently blacklisted from Chinese-owned social media app TikTok.

“Tik Tok has permanently banned PragerU from its platform for ‘multiple violations’ of their community guidelines,” PragerU wrote in a tweet on Thursday. “This is blatant censorship.” The organization started a petition over TikTok’s blacklisting.

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Commentary: Holding Big Tech Accountable for January 6

Admin

Nearly 300 Americans face a slew of charges related to the melee on Capitol Hill last January. As I’ve reported over the past few months, offenses range from assaulting a police officer to destroying government property to trespassing.

More than 70 protestors stand accused of “aiding and abetting” various crimes; even people who didn’t vandalize the Capitol or even enter the building have been charged with helping others do damage and interrupt Congress’ certification of the Electoral College results.

Nonviolent offenders languish behind bars for months, denied bail, and transported to Washington, D.C. to await delayed trials. Federal prosecutors suggest President Trump could be indicted for fueling the chaos that day. Democratic congressmen want their Republican colleagues held accountable for their alleged role, too.

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Nearly Every Lawmaker Overseeing Privacy, Antitrust Issues Received Big Tech Money in 2020: Report

Admin

Nearly all members of Congress who oversee privacy and antitrust issues have received donations or lobbying money from Big Tech, according to a Public Citizen report.

Ninety-four percent of lawmakers on Capitol Hill with jurisdiction over key Big Tech issues have received money from the industry, according to the Public Citizen report released Wednesday. Altogether, Big Tech political action committees (PAC) and lobbyists contributed roughly $3.2 million to lawmakers who are specifically tasked with regulating the industry.

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Trump Will Return to Social Media on His Own New Platform, Aide Says

Admin

Former President Trump will return to social media on his own new platform in around two or three months, Jason Miller said.

“But I do think that we’re gonna see President Trump returning to social media in probably about two or three months here with his own platform,” Miller said during an interview on Fox News Channel’s program Media Buzz. “And this is something that I think will be the hottest ticket in social media. It’s gonna completely redefine the game and everybody is gonna be waiting and watching to see what exactly President Trump does, but it will be his own platform.”

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Texas Moves to Outlaw Big Tech Censorship of Opposing Viewpoints

Admin

The Lone Star State, like Florida, is moving to outlaw viewpoint discrimination on social media platforms.

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott joined State Sen. Bryan Hughes at a press conference Friday afternoon to discuss a new bill that will prohibit social media companies from censoring opposing viewpoints.

“The First Amendment is under assault by these social media companies and that is not going to be tolerated in Texas,” Abbott declared.

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Commentary: The Narrative, the Coup, and the Bourgeoisie

Admin

The purges began shortly after the revolution. For all its haste and ill-preparedness, the success of the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, led by the perpetually temperamental Vladimir Lenin and fueled by a fierce devotion to Marxism, quickly gave rise to the vast and unimaginably harsh Soviet labor camp system that would come to be known as the “gulag.” As the leader of the newly established Russian Soviet Republic, Lenin wasted no time in ordering the establishment of decrees calling for the severe punishment of anyone deemed a “class enemy” to the new Soviet Republic. 

From the perspective of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, class enemies were those who had opposed the Marxist Bolshevik Revolution and often consisted of individuals the Bolsheviks contemptuously regarded as privileged in their social class. These so-called class enemies, a term which eventually became synonymous with the “bourgeoisie,” ostensibly posed a threat to the proletariat-ruled, Marxist utopia Lenin was promising to the masses. 

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Trump-Friendly Groups Ready to Take on Big Tech

Peter D'Abrosca

A trio of pro-Trump groups are ready to wage a massive battle against Silicon Valley titans of industry after the former president was drummed off social media prior to leaving office. 

“The Center for American Restoration, the new organization stood up by former Trump administration official Russ Vought, is leading a coalition of groups calling for a ‘proliferation of legislative activity’ to reform Big Tech,” Axios reported. 

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Twitter Bans Nearly 400 Accounts for Allegedly ‘Undermining NATO’

Admin

On Tuesday, Big Tech giant Twitter announced that it had banned approximately 373 accounts for allegedly posting content that “undermined faith in the NATO alliance and its stability,” as reported by Breitbart.

Twitter claimed that the accounts in question were part of “state-linked information operations” that were supposedly linked to the governments of Russia, Iran, and Armenia. Of the 373, 130 were targeted “based on intel provided by the FBI” that claimed the accounts had attempted to “disrupt the public conversation during the first 2020 U.S. presidential debate.”

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After Defying COVID Groupthink, Big Tech Censors, DeSantis Hosts CPAC as Rising GOP Star for 2024

Admin

When Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis takes the stage to deliver a welcoming address at the Conservative Political Action Conference on his home field in Orlando Friday, it will be as a fast-rising force in the conservative movement and an increasingly plausible and popular contender for his party’s presidential nomination in 2024.

DeSantis will be followed in the spotlight on the first full day of CPAC 2021 by a succession of marquee GOP names vying to woo the party’s conservative base at the movement’s signature annual gathering of the tribes. Among them will be potential 2024 GOP presidential hopefuls and aspiring heirs to the leadership of their party’s populist conservative wing, including Sens. Ted Cruz, Tom Cotton, and Josh Hawley, of Texas, Arkansas and Missouri, respectively.

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Salesforce Execs Caught on Video Canceling RNC, Project Veritas over Politics

Peter D'Abrosca

In a 10-minute video, Project Veritas exposed Salesforce executives bashing the GOP for the mostly peaceful protests at the Capitol on January 6, just weeks after the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) company unexpectedly severed ties with the journalistic nonprofit.

The footage from virtual meetings held by high-level executives was sent to Project Veritas by a whistleblower inside the company, according to Veritas’ founder James O’Keefe.

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Big Tech Employees Donated More to Biden’s Campaign Than Any Other Sector

Admin

Employees at Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Alphabet, Google’s parent company, donated at least $15.1 million to President Joe Biden’s presidential campaign, according to Open Secrets.

The donations eclipsed the amount given from employees in the banking and legal sectors, according to The Wall Street Journal. The five companies were also the largest fundraising sources for Biden’s campaign.

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Parler Resumes Social Media App After Securing New Computer Servers

Admin

Parler, the upstart social media platform silenced last month by big-tech censorship, said Monday it is resuming operations under new leadership and with new computer servers.

Parler moved to a new computer server farm, and the 20 million users on the platform when Amazon Web Services shut off the social media platform on Jan. 11 can begin using their old app and logins Monday, Interim CEO Mark Meckler told Just the News.

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A Study Touted as a Blow to Conservatives’ Complaints About Big Tech Censorship Was Funded by a Major Biden Donor

Admin

A study from New York University released on Monday that dismisses conservative allegations of Big Tech bias and calls for President Joe Biden to establish a Digital Regulatory Agency was funded by Craig Newmark, a billionaire tech titan who donated $100,000 to Biden’s campaign victory fund.

The study, entitled “False Accusation: The Unfounded Claim that Social Media Companies Censor Conservatives,” also defends decisions by Facebook and Twitter to both ban President Donald Trump from their platforms last month, and to limit circulation of a story from The New York Post weeks before the election about emails from Hunter Biden’s laptop.

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Commentary: Conservatives Need to Stand Up for Their Own Civil Rights

Admin

For those making their arguments about whether Section 230 should be repealed or reformed to protect conservatives on social media, it’s time to declare that this ship sailed long ago. Most of the world has now come to accept that these monolithic platforms can remove people or their content at will. The banning of President Trump and a host of other conservatives from all major platforms has proven this point beyond dispute. 

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Conservative Groups Funded by Google Oppose Anti-Trust Action

Admin

A handful of conservative organizations have signed onto a letter to House Republicans stating their opposition to any proposed anti-trust action against Big Tech companies, according to Breitbart.

The 10-page letter, addressed to Congressmen Ken Buck (R-Colo.), Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), and Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), declared on behalf of these groups that “both sides of the aisle are pushing for the weaponization of anti-trust, either as a tool to punish corporate actors with whom they disagree or out of a presupposition that big is bad.”

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Hungary Weighs Big Tech Sanctions over ‘Systemic Abuses’ of Free Speech

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Hungarian Justice Minister Judit Varga said Monday that Hungary is considering sanctions against big tech firms over alleged “systemic abuses” of free speech, Reuters reported.

Varga plans to meet with the Hungarian Competition Authority this week to discuss possible penalties for what he says are unfair commercial practices utilized by social media firms including Facebook and Twitter, according to Reuters. In addition, the minister plans to convene a meeting with the state-sponsored Digital Freedom Committee.

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Texas AG Launches Investigation into Big Tech’s ‘Biased Policies’ After Trump’s Twitter Ban

Admin

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced an investigation into the content moderation policies of multiple Silicon Valley based tech companies after President Trump was permanently banned from Twitter last week.

Paxton’s office demanded four big tech giants such as Facebook, Twitter, Apple, Amazon and Google provide information relating to their censoring of conservative speech as well as their termination of the popular conservative social media app Parler from their platforms.

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Commentary: Big Tech’s Conservative Purge Changes the Free Speech Debate

RealClearWire

Big Tech’s coordinated silencing of conservative voices, including President Trump’s, signals a crossing of the Rubicon in the debate over government involvement to protect free speech.

Even conservatives like me, who have long argued that small-business competition is the best way to moderate the tech oligarchs’ power, recognize that government may now have an interest in making some large companies, such as basic web-hosting platforms, utilities akin to AT&T.

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Tennessee Principal on Administrative Leave for Warning Students About Social Media Censorship

Corinne Murdock

A Tennessee principal was placed on paid administrative leave after warning students about the dangers of social media censorship. Principal Barton Thorne recorded a homeroom video on Monday, reportedly sharing his thoughts via the Shelby County Schools (SCS) virtual learning platform to address several Big Tech companies’ recent decisions to censor various individuals and platforms.

In a recording of the video since deleted from YouTube, Thorne emphasized the need to allow for free speech and a “marketplace of ideas.” He condemned the Capitol Hill riot and stated that his statements had nothing to do with President Donald Trump.

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YouTube Suspends Trump Account for at Least Seven Days

Admin

YouTube became the latest social media platform to ban President Donald Trump, announcing late Tuesday that he wouldn’t be able to post new content for seven days.

YouTube, a subsidiary of Google, said it took the action against Trump because of the potential for violence to be sparked from his content. The massive video-sharing platform joined Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Twitch, Reddit and many others in suspending or banning the president, Axios reported.

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Maury County Mayor Andy Ogles Calls for Tennessee to Dump Any State-Held Equity in Big Tech Companies Over Censorship

Jason M. Reynolds

Maury County Mayor Andy Ogles is calling on the Tennessee General Assembly to dump any state-held equity and debt in the Big Tech companies over their “war on freedom of speech.”

Ogles made the announcement on his Facebook page Wednesday, available here. It is addressed to Governor Bill Lee, Lieutenant Governor Randy McNally (R-Oak Ridge), House Speaker Cameron Sexton (R-Crossville) and the other members of the Legislature.

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Twitter Says It Purged Over 70,000 Accounts Sharing ‘Harmful QAnon-Associated Content’

Admin

Twitter has reportedly purged over 70,000 accounts from its platform for sharing “harmful QAnon-associated content.”

The social media website began cracking down on Twitter activity after rioters supporting President Donald Trump stormed the United States Capitol on Wednesday, committing acts of vandalism and postponing the certification process as members of Congress were forced to evacuate the building.

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Analysis: The Great Social Silencing

RealClearWire

Last week Silicon Valley silenced the president. In unison, the social media giants, with an assist from Amazon and Apple, also eliminated their most popular conservative competitor and announced that their own moderation policies would now extend to other companies. Meanwhile, CNN openly called for Fox News to be banned from cable, while a major talk radio network issued new speech rules to its hosts, extending tech’s moderation policies to the offline world. Beyond all this, Congress and the European Union called for powerful new regulation of online speech.

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