The federal government is continuing to study Silicon Valley giants for potential violations of antitrust law, according to President Trump, in his latest criticism of the embattled tech industry.
Asked by Axios to clarify which companies the Trump administration is considering, Trump said: “All three” — referring to Amazon.com, Facebook and Google.
Trump claimed in the interview that a previous administration had considered breaking up key players in the tech industry. But while the Federal Trade Commission had investigated Google during the Obama administration over how the company displayed its search results, the agency concluded there was no antitrust violation — and did not weigh a break up.
Some, such as Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), have called on the FTC to reopen its probe into Google.
In September, the Justice Department held a meeting with state attorneys general to discuss whether any conduct by the tech companies could have violated antitrust law. State officials have taken up the banner, opening the door to a multistate inquiry. But those discussions are still in their early stages.
And the Federal Trade Commission has held hearings this fall on the matter, though experts speaking at the conference are largely divided as to whether tech platforms pose an antitrust problem.
The European Union has proved more aggressive than U.S. regulators. In recent months, European antitrust officials have slapped Google with a $5 billion fine for marketing its own apps in an allegedly anticompetitive fashion, prompting Google to stop bundling its browser and search engine with the Google Play store in Europe. The E.U.'s competition regulator has also targeted Apple for alleged tax evasion and Facebook for providing “misleading” information about its deal to purchase WhatsApp.