US: Mnuchin: Officials should take a serious look at big tech

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin on Monday, May 21, joined the growing chorus of government officials concerned about tech monopolies, reported Bloomberg.

“These issues deserve to be reviewed carefully,” Mnuchin said in a CNBC interview early Monday in response to a question about the CBS News report. “These are issues the Justice Department needs to look at seriously, not for any one company, but as these technology companies have a greater and greater impact on the economy.”

The report highlighted how critics and rivals, such as Yelp, are trying to bring Europe’s antitrust approach to Google to the US. Margrethe Vestager, the European Union competition commissioner, told CBS that she is intent on stopping Google’s “illegal behavior” in web search, suggesting that the regulator isn’t appeased by the company’s proposed solution for the hefty charges the EU filed last year.

Mnuchin’s comments come on the heels of a “60 Minutes” segmenton Google’s unparalleled market share in online search. The Sunday night spot included an interview with Jeremy Stoppelman, co-founder of Yelp, which he said “would have no shot” if it were being built today.

“That opportunity has been closed off by Google and their approach,” Stoppelman told “60 Minutes.” “If you provide great content in one of these categories that is lucrative to Google, and seen as potentially threatening, they will snuff you out … They will make you disappear. They will bury you.”

Full Content: Bloomberg

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