Tech giants could face major business changes under series of new bills in Congress

Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, Youtube all could be affected

WASHINGTON – Tech giants including Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google could be forced to make sweeping changes to their businesses under a series of new bills.

According to CNN, the bipartisan legislation marks Congress’ most significant push to date to rein in Silicon Valley, and in some cases, take direct aim at the tech giants’ underlying business models.

If successful, the legislation could force Google to stop promoting Youtube in its search results, or prohibit Amazon from selling products on its marketplace that compete directly with third-party seller listings.

Meanwhile, Apple could be required to relax its restrictions on iOS app developers and Facebook could be banned from acquiring companies for the purpose of stifling future rivals.

The most aggressive of the five bills, which addresses concerns about tech giants using their control over multiple business lines to favor their own products or to suppress rivals, opens the door to breakups of the companies if they don’t comply.

The bills do not name specific companies but, virtually every legislative proposal seeks to respond to the findings of a 16-month investigation of the tech industry conducted by the house judiciary committee’s antitrust panel.


About the Authors:

Roslyn Jimenez is a news producer at KSAT. Before joining the team, she was a producer and video editor at KIII-TV and a radio intern in Corpus Christi. She graduated from Del Mar College with an Associate's degree in political science and liberal arts. Roslyn is family-oriented and loves spending time with her fiancé and chihuahua Paco.

Max Massey is the GMSA weekend anchor and a general assignments reporter. Max has been live at some of the biggest national stories out of Texas in recent years, including the Sutherland Springs shooting, Hurricane Harvey and the manhunt for the Austin bomber. Outside of work, Max follows politics and sports, especially Penn State, his alma mater.