France Seeks to Further Tighten Regulation of US Tech Firms

France plans to redouble its push to tighten regulation of big US tech companies at the national and European level, part of Europe's backlash against the growing influence -- and profit -- of a handful of large Internet firms.

The French government will begin public consultations on a new "digital" law for France, and start working on a common strategy with Germany to develop new digital regulations in Europe for companies such as Google and Facebook said Axelle Lemaire, France's junior minister for digital affairs.

"The risk is that the Internet of tomorrow will be paralyzed by monopolies," Lemaire said. "They have the power of life or death over a large number of players in the digital ecosystem."

The country hopes to build on broader pressure facing American Web companies in Europe. A coalition of French and German politicians and companies have been pressuring the European Union to scrap its tentative antitrust agreement with Google to settle concerns that the company abuses its dominant Internet-search engine. At the same time, European officials are digging into tax structures that companies -- often tech firms -- use to reduce the amount of tax they pay on revenue generated in Europe.