According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, CEOs from the biggest tech companies have been subpoenaed over content moderation. That includes CEOs of Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft.
CEOs from biggest tech companies have been subpoenaed over content moderation
As many of you know, the House of Representatives is being controlled by Republicans now, and they apparently want to get to the bottom of content moderation practices. It seems like the aforementioned CEOs have until March 23 to respond.
They have been subpoenaed by the House Judiciary Chairman, Jim Jordan. It seems like his panel wants to know “how and to what extent” the federal government allegedly pressured and coordinated with companies to censor content.
It seems like the House of Representatives wants the details here. They want to know the details about people responsible for shaping moderation policies, as well as those who’ve talked to the executive branch.
It’s not exactly a secret that Republican politicians believe that major tech companies censor conservative views. So, this whole initiative is supposed to get to the bottom of everything.
Twitter has been excluded
You will notice that Twitter was not subpoenaed by the House of Representatives. They probably believe that Twitter is not so much in the wrong as the others, especially with Elon Musk at the helm. That’s just a guess.
Twitter not only reinstated Donald Trump’s account (as did Meta, though), but it has also been sharing internal “Twitter Files” that shared a ton of information with the public.
According to Engadget, all the firms have denied allegations of bias. They said that they’re only trying to “remove falsehoods and other harmful material”, says Engadget. Microsoft did respond when asked to comment, and said that it plans to work in “good faith” with the committee.
It remains to be seen what will come of all this. Previous attempts to prove anti-conservative bias have failed, so… this time may be no different, we’ll see.
2023-02-20 15:07:10