For the past year, IGP research has been exploring the interaction of competition policy and cybersecurity/privacy concerns, particularly as it pertains to the large platforms. We have shown how privacy and security have become product differentiators in the digital economy. As large platforms such as Apple and Google compete by...
March 28, 2022 The EC Digital Markets Act’s Misguided Moves The European Union’s Digital Markets Act is repeating all the mistakes made by telecom regulators 30-40 years ago in their attempt to promote competition by mandating interconnection and interoperability. They have decided to require certain forms of technical compatibility with...
February 22, 2022 EARN IT Act moves forward The Senate Judiciary Committee has approved a new version of the highly controversial Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act (EARN IT Act). First introduced in March 2020, EARN IT Act pares back the immunity protections under Section 230 of...
1 January, 2022 Happy New Year! To start off 2022 we look back - and forward - at the granddaddy of Internet governance issues, domain names. TLDs go Hippety Hop ICANN is embroiled in a controversy about approving the transfer of a TLD (.HIPHOP) from its original owner (Uni Registry...
November 1, 2021 Facebook tries to change the subject After becoming the scapegoat of choice for all of society’s ills, from the “death of democracy” to teenage girls’ social comparisons to amplifying hate speech, Mark Zuckerberg announced a change to the company’s name and a shift in its focus. While...
September 16, 2021 App Stores’ Market Power Challenged Legal and regulatory actions are beginning to target the economic leverage of Apple’s and Google’s mobile app stores, but the cases make it clear that the conflict is primarily among competing suppliers rather than between the platforms and their users. The two...
Crisis at AFRINIC The African Network Information Centre (Afrinic), the African regional Internet registry (RIR) for IP addresses, has had its bank accounts frozen by court order, crippling its operations. The Supreme Court of Mauritius ordered the RIR’s $50 million account frozen as a result of its contractual dispute with...
June 30, 2021 The USG goes after the platforms The attitudinal backlash against digital platforms (Amazon, Apple, Google, Facebook and Twitter) has quickly been translated into public policy. The Biden Administration has appointed Lina Kahn, an Ivy League law professor whose work on antitrust has been praised and promoted by...
Ever since the GDPR thwacked it on the side of its head, ICANN has been trying to bring its registry of domain names into compliance with basic privacy principles. The good news is that ICANN has largely succeeded in doing that. Go to this URL, enter our domain name, internetgovernance.org,...
China fines Ali Baba for competing vigorously; platform governance becomes a thing; reports of a digital currency war are greatly exaggerated; NSA’s “we need visibility” thesis is contested. From China, with love China’s State Administration for Market Regulation has fined Ali Baba 18.228 billion yuan (about 2.79 billion U.S. dollars)...
“In characteristically rigorous fashion, Mueller’s outstanding book punctures the alarmist myth of Internet fragmentation and helps us to understand what is really at stake as nations and other groups vie for power over the Internet.”
