ACCC head Rod Sims is in Washington, arguing big tech is a threat to the public good
Australia’s competition tzar has warned Washington that the uneven playing field between tech giants and traditional media poses a grave threat to the public good.
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Australia’s competition tzar has warned leading regulators in Washington that the uneven playing field between tech giants and traditional media poses a grave threat to journalism and public good.
Rod Sims, head of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, told antitrust experts in Washington yesterday that global competition and consumer laws must be employed to reign in the unfair advantage of digital giants.
He said the coverage of the Christchurch Mosque massacre highlighted one of the many ‘staggering’ differences in the rules governing traditional media versus digital giants like Facebook and Google.
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“If I could use the stark example of the recent tragedy in New Zealand where 50 people died at the hands of a lunatic gunman,” Mr Sims told the American Bar Association’s Antitrust law conference. “That was streamed on digital media particular Facebook for some time before it was taken down and of course there were no rules about that. But our media companies screened redacted versions of that for a very short time and now they are getting hauled up in front of the media regulators for having broken rules.’
Mr Sims is in Washington to tell the US government, regulators and experts about the ACCC’s pioneering draft report into digital platforms. The preliminary report, released in December, is highly critical of the negative impact of Facebook and Google on competition and consumers.
“The number of rules the media companies operate under versus the digital platforms is just staggering,’ Mr Sims told the conference which is attended by the most senior competition experts and regulators in the US and around the world.
“The rules about how they can advertise limit their ability to get advertisements in ways the digital platforms are not limited at all.’
Mr Sims used the example of Australia’s ban on election advertising in traditional media for three days before an election.
“That is the best time to advertise just when people are thinking about going to the ballot box,” Mr Sims said. “So where do they (political parties) advertise? They advertise on Facebook and Google which makes a lot money for them but traditional media are excluded from that and that’s no good. We can’t have an uneven playing field — that should be of concern for everybody interested in competition law.’
In an exclusive interview with News Corp, Mr Sims said he believes the US government and regulators are taking a ‘new look’ at these issues with an ‘open mind.’
The ACCC’s draft report on digital platforms calls for greater regulatory oversight of digital giants like Facebook and Google, warning that their dominant position risked harming both competition and consumers.
The US traditionally has been loath to impose regulations on companies, especially US tech giants, fearing it would stifle innovation.
But Mr Sims says there is now a greater recognition in the US, including in Congress, that tech giants needed to be held more accountable.
“We are hoping to influence world policy and change world views on this, there is no doubt about that, and that includes the US,’ he said. “We will come out with our (final report) recommendations at the end of the year and until then I am in listening mode. Once they come out we will advocate for them internationally.’
Google and Facebook, which fear the ACCC may set a global precedent on regulating them, have hit back at the ACCC preliminary report. Facebook has called some of its recommendations “unworkable, unnecessary and unprecedented.’
But Mr Sims told US competition experts yesterday that the future of journalism was at risk unless something was done.
“(Digital platforms) make it very hard for (traditional) journalism to monetise and I think we must need to be careful about losing journalism because in classic economic terms journalism is a public good,” he said.
“Where you have new entrants who are bringing journalists with them that a fine, (but) where you have the anonymity of information, the atomisation of information, you’re getting your information almost crowded sourced rather than from journalism sources — I think that’s the issue we have to think about.’
“I’m worried about non-critical news, I want a journalist to be questioning what governments are doing in a way that is fact checked and does have certain standards.’
“On this future of journalism, I think (the) antitrust (industry) needs to be careful it doesn’t just haughtily dismiss the issue.’
Mr Sims said he had received ‘mixed reviews’ in the US so far about the ACCC proposals, some of which he said represented a major change to America’s traditional hands-off approach.
“There have been two different reactions (here),’ he said. “The negative reaction is that the issues raised by digital platforms are not ones that an economic agency should be involved in.
The other extreme is people welcoming the first broad look at digital platform issues. They think that the (ACCC) analysis has really been the first of its kind and has really laid a great platform internationally for people who are looking at this in new ways.’
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During his week long visit to the US Mr Sims is meeting with leading antitrust figures including the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission Joe Simons and the chairman of the House Subcommittee of Antitrust David Cicilline.
Mr Sims says the US tradition has been to raise the standard for intervention by authorities like the ACCC so high that often nothing is done.
“The big debate here is ‘as a competition enforcer do you wait for someone to break the law and then jump on it?’ Our recommendations are a bit ahead of that, are more proactive,’ he said.
“Let’s get a good understanding of the problem and come up with the right solutions and perhaps do that on a worldwide basis.’
(Cameron Stewart is also US Contributor for Sky News Australia)
Originally published as ACCC head Rod Sims is in Washington, arguing big tech is a threat to the public good
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