Digital Content

The tech world order that came together in the '90s at the Cold War's end is falling apart as a new rift between Russia and the West opens and a great retrenchment begins. The breakup of the USSR in the early '90s opened an era in which internet use rapidly spread around the globe and US tech companies viewed the entire planet as both factory floor and market. Working from that assumption helped a handful of companies grow to previously inconceivable size, wealth and power.

House Republican Leaders sent a letter to US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy regarding the Biden Administration's approach to COVID-19 related misinformation on tech platforms. "We write with significant concerns that the Biden Administration continues to undermine the First Amendment by pressuring technology companies to censor specific users and certain speech," reads the letter sent by Reps Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA), Jim Jordan (R-OH), Steve Scalise (R-LA) and James Comer (R-KY). "The First Amendment prohibits the government from directly censoring speech it finds objectionable.

The tech industry is lobbying statehouses across the country to pass privacy bills that critics call weak. Most tech firms would prefer a nationwide law, but since Congress hasn't budged on the issue, the industry now seeks to preempt states from approving tougher privacy rules like California's. Utah lawmakers considered and passed a state privacy bill in less than two weeks, and it's now awaiting the governor's signature. Utah would become the fourth state with a privacy law, following Colorado, Virginia and California.

The early broadcast era and our current platform era bear some striking resemblances, but one parallel looms large: In the 1940s, we lost a key battle to build a potentially liberating and wondrous medium—and we are on the cusp of doing so again. Then as now, commercial operators defined the terms by which we could use our core communication and information infrastructures. Democratic oversight, public alternatives, and social responsibilities were kept to a minimum. Democratic societies must now fight to prevent this from happening again.

Four trade groups and advocacy organizations representing the major tech companies spent roughly $2 million on Facebook advertisements opposing tech-related antitrust bills since the start of 2022. That number, which comes courtesy of an analysis of Facebook’s ad archives by Politico, will likely only increase as legislation to rein in the power of the tech giants moves through the House and Senate. Ad buys from tech trade group NetChoice made up the bulk of that spending.

Tools to sidestep internet restrictions have surged in Russia following the invasion of Ukraine and the government's decision to block some social media services, including Facebook. Finding ways around Russia's internet blockade could enable its citizens to stay connected to the rest of the world and gather information from sources beyond state-owned outlets. Virtual private networks, or VPNs, enable users to hide their locations to evade location-based restrictions and make browsing more private by encrypting internet traffic.

Gallup and the Knight Foundation conducted a survey of US adults regarding media and democracy. Major findings include:

Digital assets, including cryptocurrencies, have seen explosive growth in recent years, surpassing a $3 trillion market cap last November and up from $14 billion just five years prior. Surveys suggest that around 16 percent of adult Americans – approximately 40 million people – have invested in, traded, or used cryptocurrencies.

Apple shareholders approved outside proposals recommending audits of the company’s civil-rights impact and a public report on its use of concealment clauses in employment agreements, marking a rare instance of investors defying the tech giant. The votes were part of Apple’s annual shareholder meeting, held virtually on March 4 for the second year in a row. Investors also reelected the company’s board and approved its executive compensation plan.

The internet promised a world in which no government could fully hide the truth from its people. Russia's free-speech crackdown following its invasion of Ukraine is testing that premise as never before. How everyday Russians view the conflict is likely to determine their willingness to support Vladimir Putin and his war. Russia has succeeded in driving out or shutting down some of the most popular internet services while also squelching the remnants of Russia's own independent news operations.