In last night’s State of the Union (SOTU) speech, President Biden hit the bullseye on the tech issues voters really care about: taking on social media and privacy abuses. His silence on the “Big Tech” antitrust bills, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act (S. 2992) and the Open App Markets Act (S. 2710)—which would harm privacy, security, and small business competitiveness—was resounding and a welcome recognition that those bills are not the answer.

The remarks come as Congress is considering a government takeover of app stores. The bills’ sponsors say they’re taking on social media giants like Facebook—and yet, Facebook would benefit enormously from this rash rewrite of antitrust law, while small app makers would bear the costs. Nowhere in SOTU invitee Frances Haugen’s congressional testimonies does she suggest that the policy response to her revelations should involve freeing Facebook from app store privacy controls—and yet that’s exactly what S. 2992 and S. 2710 would do. Meanwhile, the President’s comments provide an opportunity and renewed validation for the difficult bipartisan work the Senate and House Commerce Committees have been doing to produce a compromise national privacy law.

Strengthening Privacy Bolsters Small App Makers, Weakening Privacy Hurts Them

App developers and related businesses employ more than 5.9 million Americans, across all 50 states, comprising a 1.7 trillion-dollar app economy. The app economy has created the highest job growth of any industry in key states, including Colorado, Georgia, Maryland, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, and Virginia.  For small app makers, the app stores are a key ingredient to their ability to continue this incredible growth. The last thing small developers want is for Congress to undermine them so that Facebook can squirm free of software platform-imposed restrictions on its vast data collection enterprise.

 President Biden Says, “Strengthen Privacy,” the Antitrust Bills Say “Privacy is for Sale”

During the SOTU speech, the President called on Congress to “strengthen privacy protections,” arguing that “we must hold social media companies accountable for the national experiment they’re conducting on our children for profit.” The antitrust bills do the opposite. Specifically, S. 2710 and S. 2992 would prohibit the app stores’ privacy controls that prevent Facebook from tracking you across apps without your express consent. The proposals would open treasure troves of consumers’ most sensitive data, and yet we still lack a strong federal privacy law that sets rules of the road for protecting, processing, and providing transparency about personal information.

President Biden Says, “Hold Social Media Accountable,” the Antitrust Bills say “Give Social Media More Consumer Data”

The bills’ proponents are willing to open unfettered access to your data, device features like your camera and microphone, and even your wallet to Facebook and to blatant fraudsters, in order to achieve their antitrust expansion priorities. Now it’s clear that those priorities are misaligned with the President’s, but line up neatly with those of Facebook, which, if the bills were enacted, stands to rake back billions in surveillance advertising revenue lost when consumers chose not to be tracked across apps on their phones. Of course, the changes these bills force on app stores would benefit the largest companies that do business on the platforms, like Facebook, while hurting App Association member companies the most. If consumers lose trust in the app stores, the resulting reluctance to download new software hits the smallest app makers the hardest.

Facebook clearly places a high value on the ability to evade software platform-imposed restrictions on its data collection and monetization activities. S. 2992 and S. 2710 do not just provide wiggle room, they provide a wide avenue with formidable federal enforcement capabilities keeping the avenue free of obstacles. Unfortunately, that road would be paved with App Association member prospects and the consumer harms certain to result from an ad-supported environment dependent on manipulation, which federal policy would protect, not prohibit.

Congress should follow the President’s call and ditch these ill-conceived antitrust bills and focus instead on what consumers and small businesses really want: comprehensive national privacy legislation.

Check out the facts on The American Innovation and Choice Online Act (S. 2992) and the Open App Markets Act (S. 2710)

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