Big Tech

Big Tech, also known as the Tech Giants or Tech Titans, is a grouping of the largest IT companies in the world. The concept of Big Tech is similar to the grouping of dominant companies in other sectors. It typically refers to the Big Five United States tech companies: Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft; or the Magnificent Seven, which includes Nvidia and Tesla. Big Tech can also include Chinese companies such as Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, and Xiaomi (BATX).

Brand logos of the Big Five tech companies

History

In the 20th century, IBM and Microsoft dominated the IT industry. After the dot-com bubble wiped out most of the Nasdaq Composite stock market index, surviving tech startups expanded their market share and became dominant in their markets. The term Big Tech began to appear around 2013, when some economists speculated that a lack of regulation could lead to concentrated market power. The term Big Tech became popular following the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, because access to a large amount of data allowed tech companies to influence their users. The concept of Big Tech is similar to how the largest oil companies were called Big Oil following the 1970s energy crisis, and the largest cigarette producers were called Big Tobacco, as Congress sought to regulate those industries. It is also similar to how, at the turn of the 21st century, the mainstream media became dominated by a small number of corporations called Big Media or the Media Giants. In the early 2020s, software developers and cryptocurrency users responded to the perceived excesses of the tech giants by starting a movement called web3 to incorporate blockchain-based decentralization into the World Wide Web.

Big Tech companies

U.S. companies

The largest corporations in the United States by market capitalization

Alphabet

Alphabet is the parent company of Google. As of 2024^[update], Google is the leader in online advertising (Google Ads), online search (Google Search), video sharing (YouTube), email (Gmail), web browsers (Google Chrome), web mapping (Google Maps and Waze), mobile operating systems (Android), and cloud storage (Google Drive). Google Cloud Platform is the third most popular cloud computing platform after Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure. Google and Meta have been called a digital advertising duopoly. Google earns 82% of its revenue and most of its profit from advertising.

In addition to its Google products, Alphabet is a global leader in artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and self-driving cars. In 2019, Google claimed its Sycamore processor had achieved quantum supremacy. In 2021, Alphabet's subsidiary Waymo was the first company to offer public robotaxi service. Alphabet reached $1 trillion in market capitalization for the first time in January 2020.

Amazon

With Amazon Alexa and Amazon Echo, Amazon is the leader in the area of artificial intelligence-based personal digital assistants and smart speakers (Amazon Echo) with 69% market share followed by Google (Google Nest) at 25% market share. Amazon Web Services made up 59% of Amazon's profit in 2020, and more than half of the company's profit every year since 2014. After Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) was released in 2006, Google developed Google App Engine (now Google Cloud Platform) and Microsoft developed Windows Azure (now Microsoft Azure).

After crossing $1 trillion during trading hours once in September 2018 and again in January 2020, Amazon closed above $1 trillion for the first time in April 2020. In November 2022, Amazon fell below $1 trillion for the first time since 2020, part of a 51% decline from $1.7 trillion at the beginning of 2022 to $834 billion at the end of the year. By May 2023, Amazon stock was again worth more than $1 trillion. In June 2024, Amazon crossed $2 trillion in market capitalization.

Apple

Apple sells consumer electronics, including laptops, smartphones, and smartwatches. Apple shares a duopoly with Google in mobile operating systems, with Apple's iOS controlling 27% market share and Google's Android controlling 72%.

In August 2018, Apple became the first publicly traded U.S. company in history to reach a market capitalization of $1 trillion. In August 2020, Apple became the first publicly traded U.S. company in history to reach a market capitalization of $2 trillion. In January 2022, Apple became the first publicly traded U.S. company in history to reach a market capitalization of $3 trillion. In January 2023, Apple fell below $2 trillion. Apple closed above $3 trillion for the first time in June 2023 and closed above $3 trillion again in December 2023.

Meta

Meta Platforms (formerly Facebook) owns the Facebook social networking service, the Instagram image sharing service, and the WhatsApp instant messaging service. Facebook also acquired Oculus in 2014, entering the virtual reality market.

After closing above $1 trillion for the first time in June 2021 as Facebook, Meta Platforms finished 2021 below $1 trillion. In February 2022, Meta Platforms fell to less than $600 billion (setting a record for the largest one-day drop in U.S. stock market history), and was no longer within the top 20 most valuable U.S. companies after falling to $270 billion in October 2022. In January 2024, Meta crossed $1 trillion during trading hours.

Microsoft

Microsoft controls the majority of market share in desktop operating systems (Microsoft Windows),productivity software (Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365), and business communication software (Microsoft Teams). Microsoft owns the second biggest cloud computing platform (Microsoft Azure) after Amazon Web Services. Microsoft is also one of the biggest companies in the video game industry (Microsoft Gaming).

In April 2019, Microsoft reached $1 trillion in market capitalization for the first time. In June 2021, Microsoft crossed $2 trillion for the first time, and in October 2021 briefly surpassed Apple as the most valuable company in the world before finishing the year second to Apple at $2.5 trillion. After its stock fell during most of 2022, Microsoft finished the year below $2 trillion. By May 2023, Microsoft stock was again worth more than $2 trillion. In January 2024, Microsoft briefly surpassed Apple as the most valuable U.S. company, and crossed $3 trillion during trading hours.

Nvidia

Nvidia is a software and fabless company which designs and supplies graphics processing units (GPUs), application programming interfaces (APIs) for data science and high-performance computing, as well as system on a chip units (SoCs) for the mobile computing and automotive market. Nvidia is also a dominant supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) hardware and software. In the early 2020s, Nvidia became the leading producer of AI chips, drastically increasing its capitalization. Nvidia crossed $1 trillion in market capitalization by May 2023, and by the end of 2024, had surpassed Amazon and Alphabet while vying with Microsoft and Apple for the most valuable publicly-traded U.S. company.

Tesla

Tesla's classification as a tech company has been debated. In 2022, Fortune included Tesla in Big Tech, and The Washington Post argued that Tesla vehicles are comparable to iPhones.Business Insider argued that Tesla should be classified as an automaker.Barron's argued that Tesla is a tech company, but not a good one due to differences in the IT and automotive markets.The Wall Street Journal raised concerns about the supply chain, the semiconductor shortage, and the price of electric vehicle batteries. In October 2021, Tesla crossed $1 trillion in market capitalization. During the 2022 stock market decline, Tesla stock fell 73% from $1.3 trillion in November 2021 to $495 billion at the end of 2022, including a 40% drop in December 2022 alone. In response to the stock price declining over twice as much as the Nasdaq Composite index, Tesla CEO Elon Musk advised employees not to be bothered by the "stock market craziness". In November 2024, Tesla recrossed $1 trillion in market capitalization.

Other U.S. companies

Smaller U.S. Big Tech companies

Company	Revenue (USD)	Profit (USD)	Subsidiaries
IBM	60 billion	2 billion	Red Hat
Tesla	81 billion	12 billion	—
Oracle	50 billion	8 billion	Cerner
Netflix	31 billion	5 billion	—
Nvidia	27 billion	4 billion	—
Salesforce	31 billion	0.2 billion	Tableau Slack
Adobe	17 billion	5 billion	—

Smaller companies like Adobe, IBM, Netflix, Oracle, Salesforce, Snap, Uber, and X are sometimes referred to as Big Tech due to their popular influence.

Asian companies

Two Chinese tech companies, Alibaba and Tencent, were among the top ten most valuable public companies worldwide at the end of the 2010s. Smyrnaios argued in 2016 that the Asian tech giants Samsung, Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent could be included in the definition of Big Tech.TikTok developer ByteDance and drone manufacturer DJI have also been called Big Tech.

Groupings

Big Four

In the early 2010s, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, and Meta were commonly referred to as the Big Four. They were also referred to as The Four, the Gang of Four, and the Four Horsemen. They were known as GAFA before Facebook changed its name to Meta in 2021.Eric Schmidt, Phil Simon, and Scott Galloway grouped the Big Four together based on their ability to create social change. They serve billions of users, and are able to influence user behavior and control large amounts of user data. As such, they have been criticized for creating a new economic order called surveillance capitalism. According to Simon and Galloway, this distinguishes them from other Big Tech companies such as Microsoft and IBM.

In 2011, Google executive chair Eric Schmidt excluded Microsoft from the group, stating, "Microsoft is not driving the consumer revolution in the minds of the consumers." In the late 2010s, the term Big Four lost favor as Microsoft changed its business strategy and increased its market value, leading to its widespread inclusion among the other four and leading to the Big Five designation.

Big Five

Big Five tech companies

Company	Revenue (USD)	Profit (USD)	Subsidiaries
Alphabet	$283 billion	$60 billion	Google GV Waymo X
Amazon	$514 billion	$-3 billion	Audible Twitch Whole Foods
Apple	$394 billion	$99 billion	Beats
Meta	$116 billion	$23 billion	Facebook Instagram Reality Labs WhatsApp
Microsoft	$212 billion	$73 billion	GitHub LinkedIn Skype

Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft are known as the Big Five tech companies. They were known as GAFAM before Facebook changed its name to Meta in 2021. They are among the most valuable public companies. In 2020, the Big Five ranked as the second through sixth most valuable public companies in the world, behind Saudi Aramco. In August 2020, the Big Five accounted for nearly a quarter of the S&P 500. In March 2023, Apple and Microsoft accounted for 13 percent of the S&P 500. The Big Five are among the most prestigious employers in the world.

In the 21st century the Big Five tech companies surpassed the market capitalization of the historically dominant Big Oil companies BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil, and Shell. In 2019, Jason Whittaker stated that they also outpaced Big Media companies such as Comcast, Disney, and Warner Bros. Discovery by a factor of 10. In 2017, the Big Five had a combined value of over $3.3 trillion, and made up almost half of the Nasdaq-100.

Magnificent Seven

A larger group called the Magnificent Seven adds Nvidia and Tesla to the Big Five based on their contributions to the S&P 500 since 2022. In 2023, the Magnificent Seven were responsible for almost two-thirds of the S&P 500's 24% increase. The group had a 107% return on investment, which analysts credited to the AI boom and Federal Reserve rate cut expectations. In January 2024, the group accounted for 29% of the S&P 500's market capitalization. In February 2024, as the Magnificent Seven approached an unprecedented combined valuation of $13 trillion,Deutsche Bank noted that the Magnificent Seven would constitute the second largest stock market in the world as their combined market capitalization exceeded the combined value of every public company in every G20 country except China, Japan, and the United States as a whole. At the end of the second quarter of 2024, Morgan Stanley estimated that the Magnificent Seven accounted for 31% of the market capitalization of the S&P 500. Some analysts expressed concern that extreme concentration could cause a stock market crash similar to the dot-com bubble or even the Wall Street Crash of 1929. Others believe the Magnificent Seven can continue to outperform other stocks as capital flows into index funds. On August 5, 2024, the Magnificent Seven companies lost a combined $1 trillion in market capitalization at the start of trading hours.

Acronyms

Acronyms such as FANG, FAANG, GAFA, GAFAM, MAMAA, GAMMA, and others have been used to refer to Big Tech companies.Alphabet, the parent company of Google, may be represented by G in these acronyms, and Meta, the rebranding of Facebook, may be represented by F.

The acronym FANG was coined in 2013 by Jim Cramer, the television host of CNBC's Mad Money, to refer to Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, and Google. Cramer called these companies "totally dominant in their markets". Cramer stated that the four companies were poised to "take a bite out of" the bear market, giving a double meaning to the acronym, according to Cramer's colleague at RealMoney.com, Bob Lang. Cramer expanded FANG to FAANG in 2017, adding Apple to the list because its revenue made it a potential Fortune 50 company.

Following Facebook's name change to Meta Platforms in October 2021, as well as the 2015 creation of Google holding company Alphabet, Cramer suggested replacing FAANG with MAMAA, replacing Netflix with Microsoft because Netflix's valuation had fallen behind the other companies. With Microsoft, these companies were each valued at over $900 billion compared to Netflix's $310 billion. In November 2021, The Motley Fool suggested MANAMANA (a reference to the 1968 song "Mah Nà Mah Nà") as an acronym that stands for Microsoft, Apple, Netflix, Alphabet, Meta, Amazon, Nvidia, and Adobe.

At the international level Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent and Xiaomi, referred to as BATX, are often seen as Chinese competitors to Big Tech. Futurist Amy Webb has called the combination of the Big Five, IBM, Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent "G-MAFIA BAT".

Causes

Nikos Smyrnaios argued in 2016 that four phenomena allowed Big Tech to emerge: technological convergence, deregulation, globalization, and financialization. He argued that people like Nicholas Negroponte promoted technological convergence and made an Internet oligopoly appear desirable. The complexity of IT made competition law ineffective, resulting in industry self-regulation. Globalization allowed Big Tech companies to minimize their tax burden and pay foreign workers lower wages. Without regulation, Big Tech earned big profits: in 2014, Google, Apple, and Facebook earned over 20 percent profit margins.

Innovation

Critics have alleged that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act allowed Big Tech to evade responsibility for user-generated content. It states, "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." Section 230 has been called "the twenty-six words that created the Internet". Without the legal requirement for content moderation, online services could innovate freely and achieved rapid growth in the early days of the Internet.

According to Alexis Madrigal, the innovation that initially characterized Silicon Valley has been replaced by a strategy of growth through acquisitions. For example, Apple started in 1976 as an engineering-focused startup company, and quickly claimed market share from less innovative competitors like Xerox. The tech giants made timely investments in personal computers, websites, e-commerce, mobile devices, social media, and cloud computing, and rank highly on the list of companies by research and development spending. However, large companies tend to focus on operational efficiency instead of new product development.

Legal scholar Tim Wu speculated that Big Tech acquisitions could create "kill zones" that stifle competition by taking potential competitors out of the marketplace. For example, Facebook's acquisition of Instagram prevented Instagram from becoming an independent platform similar to Facebook. On the other hand, Wu stated that Microsoft's concentration of market power created a platform for new kinds of innovation.

According to the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, "Virtually all so-called killer acquisitions represent the technologies and capabilities the companies view as critical to their competitiveness. If they purchase a company innovating within this zone, they are far more likely to develop its innovation than to bury it. In doing so, they often make the technology available faster and to more people than would otherwise be possible. If companies are prevented from making acquisitions, they are more likely to copy the products or develop alternative innovations than they are to ignore them. Assuming incumbents don't violate intellectual property laws, this type of competition is both legal and socially beneficial."

Competition between cloud platforms including Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform contributed to open-source software infrastructure including LLVM and the Linux kernel. The "cloud wars" also caused Big Tech companies to invest in data centers and undersea cables. The operational efficiency of Big Tech technology stacks means startup companies typically must use Big Tech infrastructure instead of building their own.

Business strategy

Nikos Smyrnaios argued in 2016 that Big Tech companies concentrate power by vertically integrating data centers, Internet connectivity, computer hardware (including smartphones), operating systems, applications (including Web browsers), and online services. He also argued that they concentrate power by horizontally integrating different services such as email, instant messaging, online searching, downloading, and streaming across platforms. For example, Google and Microsoft pay for their search engines to be included with Apple's iPhone. According to The Economist, "Network and scale effects mean that size begets size, while data can act as a barrier to entry."

Capitalism

The 2020 American docudrama film The Social Dilemma argues that capitalism is the root cause of Big Tech's harmful practices.

Criticism

According to The Globe and Mail, both left-wing and right-wing politicians have criticized Big Tech.Progressives have alleged "runaway profit-taking and concentration of wealth", and conservatives have alleged "liberal bias". According to The New York Times, "The left generally argues that companies like Facebook and Twitter aren't doing enough to root out misinformation, extremism and hate on their platforms, while the right insists that tech companies are going so overboard in their content decisions that they're suppressing conservative political views." According to The Hill, libertarians oppose government regulation of Big Tech due to their support for laissez-faire economics.

Scott Galloway said Big Tech companies "avoid taxes, invade privacy, and destroy jobs". Nikos Smyrnaios described Big Tech as an oligopoly that dominates the information technology market through anti-competitive practices, ever-increasing economic power, and intellectual property. Smyrnaios argued that the current situation is the result of deregulation, globalization, and the failure of politicians to understand and respond to developments in technology. Smyrnaios recommended developing academic analysis of the political economy of the Internet to understand the methods of domination and to criticize these methods to encourage opposition to that domination.

Accusations of censorship and election interference

The practice of banning hate speech has received criticism from conservatives. In July 2020, the United States House Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial and Administrative Law interviewed the CEOs of Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, and Facebook. During the hearings, some members of Congress alleged bias against conservatives on social media.Matt Gaetz protested Amazon's ban on donations to hate groups, stating that Jeff Bezos should "divorce from the SPLC".

On November 5, 2020, President Donald Trump alleged "historic election interference from big money, big media, and big tech". Conservative newspaper The Washington Times criticized Trump's claims as lacking evidence. During Trump's speech that incited the January 6 United States Capitol attack, he accused Big Tech of rigging the 2020 election and promised to "get rid of" Section 230. According to Trump, "They rigged it like they have never rigged an election before, and by the way, last night, they didn't do a bad job either." After Trump's Twitter account was suspended, German Chancellor Angela Merkel's chief spokesman Steffen Seibert noted that Merkel found Twitter's halt of Trump's account "problematic", adding that legislators, not private companies, should decide on any necessary curbs to free expression if hate speech incites violence.

According to a February 2021 report by New York University researchers, conservative claims of social media censorship could be considered disinformation because the deleted statements were false. The report also recommended that social media platforms should increase their transparency to push back against claims of censorship. Conservatives argued that Facebook and Twitter limiting the spread of the Hunter Biden laptop controversy "proves Big Tech's bias". In some cases, Big Tech platforms reversed actions perceived as censorship. The YouTube channel Right Wing Watch was banned for showing far-right content to expose extreme views, but the channel was restored after viewer backlash.Human Rights Watch stated that excessive content removal, especially on Facebook, meant losing evidence of human rights abuses.

Facebook has also been accused of censoring left-wing opinions. Facebook removed ads by Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren, who advocated breaking up Facebook. Warren accused the company of having the "ability to shut down a debate" and called for "a social media marketplace that isn't dominated by a single censor".

In 2025, Meta's Facebook, Elon Musk's X, Google's YouTube, and other tech companies agreed to address online hate speech by enforcing a revised code of conduct aligned with European Commission rules. Henna Virkkunen, the EU tech commissioner, stated that Europe has zero tolerance for hate speech, whether online or offline. She approved the tech companies' commitment to enforcing the code of conduct mandated by the Digital Services Act (DSA).

Accusations of inaction toward misinformation and disinformation

Following Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, Facebook was criticized for failing to curb disinformation. In the Facebook–Cambridge Analytica data scandal, Facebook users were targeted for political propaganda based on their online activity, which Facebook monitored and shared without consent. In 2019, a Senate Intelligence Committee report criticized Facebook and Twitter for failing to stop the spread of misinformation. In response to criticism of their handling of misinformation and disinformation during the 2016 election, Big Tech companies cracked down on fake accounts and trolling.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Big Tech was criticized for allowing COVID-19 misinformation. According to Representatives Frank Pallone, Mike Doyle, and Jan Schakowsky, "Industry self-regulation has failed. We must begin the work of changing incentives driving social media companies to allow and even promote misinformation and disinformation." President Joe Biden criticized Facebook for allowing anti-vaccine activism.Imran Ahmed, CEO of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, said, "While they fail to take action, lives are being lost." In response to the criticism, Big Tech companies deleted numerous social media accounts and banned health-related false advertising. Human Rights Watch has criticized Big Tech, primarily Facebook, for allowing misinformation to spread in developing countries.

Censorship by governments

Big Tech companies have faced political censorship. China banned Google in 2010 because Google refused to censor search results critical of the Chinese Communist Party.Meta and X have been banned in China since 2009. In India, Facebook and Twitter were accused of censorship during the 2020–2021 Indian farmers' protest. The Wall Street Journal stated that Facebook only restricted content criticizing the Indian government, even if government supporters posted false statements.

In 2021, Alexei Navalny criticized Apple and Google for complying with a Russian government order to ban the Smart Voting app. On February 24, 2022, the Russian invasion of Ukraine began. In March 2022, Russia blocked Facebook and Twitter because of "disinformation" and "fake news". On March 21, 2022, Russia recognized Meta as an "extremist organization", making Meta the first public company recognized as extremist in Russia.Microsoft's LinkedIn has been blocked in Russia since 2016.

Environmental impact

This section is an excerpt from Environmental impact of Big Tech.[edit]

The environmental impact of Big Tech is a phenomenon in which many aspects of Big Tech contribute to negative impacts on the environment and climate change. In the big data age, technologists and people in general find it valuable to view emerging technologies with a critical lens, one of which is geared toward the environment. As these emerging technologies become more popular, they consider the extent at which they contribute to changes in the environment and whether they are inherently positive or negative.

A 2022 report from Greenpeace and Stand.earth highlights the technology sector's rapid growth, driving a significant increase in electricity consumption, projected to rise by over 60% between 2020 and 2030. This increase in energy usage is coupled with a rise in carbon emissions attributed to the sector's heavy dependence on fossil fuels. While some Big Tech firms have committed to transitioning to 100% renewable energy for their operations, this commitment has not yet extended to their supply chains. Seven out of ten ranked consumer electronics brands have committed to achieve 100% renewable energy across their own operations by 2030, with Apple, Google, and Microsoft already achieving this goal. In 2023, Big Tech accounted for approximately 4 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, surpassing those of the aviation industry. Google and Microsoft each consumed 24 TWh of electricity in 2023, more than countries such as Iceland, Ghana, the Dominican Republic, or Tunisia.

Reuse of copyrighted content

On May 9, 2019, the Parliament of France passed a law intended to force Big Tech to pay publishers for the reuse of substantial amounts of copyrighted content (related rights). The law is aimed at implementing Article 15 of the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market of the European Union.

Antitrust efforts

Concerns over monopolistic practices have led to antitrust investigations in Big Tech from both United States and European Union regulatory agencies. These investigations have raised concerns around Big Tech on privacy, market power, freedom of speech, national security, and law enforcement. In 2019, John Naughton wrote in The Guardian, "It's almost impossible to function without the big five tech giants."

United States

Under United States antitrust law, the consumer welfare standard assumes that large companies are not automatically harmful. Antitrust enforcement generally aims to prevent harm to consumers. According to some policy analysts, Big Tech innovation benefits consumers. Big Tech CEOs have consistently opposed antitrust regulation. Antitrust investigations of Big Tech began in the late 1990s, leading to the first major case against Big Tech in 2001, when the U.S. government accused Microsoft of illegally maintaining its monopoly position in the PC market.

Microsoft imposed legal and technical restrictions on PC manufacturers and users preventing them from uninstalling Internet Explorer and using Netscape or Java. The district court ruled that Microsoft's actions constituted monopolization under the Sherman Antitrust Act, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit affirmed most of the district court's judgments. The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced on September 6, 2001, that it would not seek to break up Microsoft, and would instead seek a lesser penalty if Microsoft agreed to share its APIs with third-party companies and appoint a three-person panel with access to Microsoft's systems, records, and source code for five years. On November 1, 2002, Judge Kollar-Kotelly accepted most of the proposed settlement, and on June 30, 2004, the U.S. appeals court unanimously approved the settlement.

In the late 2010s, Big Tech was investigated by the DOJ and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for anticompetitive mergers and acquisitions. Some Democratic presidential candidates proposed breaking up Big Tech companies or regulating them as utilities. FTC chairman Joseph Simons said, "The role of technology in the economy and in our lives grows more important every day...As I've noted in the past, it makes sense for us to closely examine technology markets to ensure consumers benefit from free and fair competition." In 2017, Elizabeth Warren criticized Big Tech for offering free services to remain more popular than the competition. The United States House Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial and Administrative Law investigated Big Tech in June 2020, and published a report in January 2021 concluding that Amazon, Apple, Google, and Meta operated in an anticompetitive manner.

On June 24, 2021, the United States House Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial and Administrative Law held hearings on proposed Big Tech regulations. Pramila Jayapal introduced HR 3825, The Ending Platform Monopolies Act, which passed the committee. The bill proposed prohibiting platform owners from offering products and services on the platforms they own. For example, in 2010, Amazon attempted to acquire Diapers.com. When Diapers.com rejected Amazon's proposal, Amazon started selling diapers at a loss. Facing unprofitability, Diapers.com agreed to let Amazon buy the company even though Walmart was willing to pay more. The committee voted that the reason for Big Tech monopolies is because of the consumer welfare standard, a legal doctrine stating that if the consumer benefits from corporate actions, those actions are generally legal. FTC chairwoman Lina Khan expressed a different view in her publication "Amazon's Antitrust Paradox".

On July 9, 2021, President Joe Biden signed Executive Order 14036, "Promoting Competition in the American Economy", a sweeping array of initiatives across the executive branch. The order established an executive branch-wide policy to more thoroughly scrutinize mergers involving Big Tech companies, with focus on the acquisition of new, potentially disruptive technology from smaller companies by the larger companies. The order also instructed the FTC to establish rules related to the use of data collection by Big Tech companies for promoting their own services. In June 2024, the DOJ and FTC opened an investigation into Microsoft, Nvidia, and OpenAI regarding their dominance in artificial intelligence. In August 2024, District of Columbia U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta ruled that Google held a monopoly in online search and text advertising in violation of Section 2 of the Sherman Antitrust Act.

European Union

The European Commission, which has imposed sanctions on several of the high-tech giants

In June 2020, the European Union opened two investigations into Apple. The first investigation focused on whether Apple uses market dominance to stifle competition in music and book streaming. The second investigation focused on Apple Pay. Apple limits the use of the iPhone's NFC technology by financial institutions, including banks.

According to European Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager, fines are insufficient to deter anticompetitive practices. Vestager stated, "Fines are not doing the trick. And fines are not enough because fines are a punishment for illegal behaviour in the past. What is also in our decision is that you have to change for the future. You have to stop what you're doing."

In September 2021, the United States and European Union began negotiating a joint approach to Big Tech regulation. The European Parliament passed the Digital Markets Act (DMA) in March 2022 to restrict data collection from European users, require social media interoperability, and allow alternative app stores and payment systems for Apple and Google smartphones. The EU also passed the Digital Services Act (DSA) in April 2022, which requires tech companies to take down hate speech and child sexual abuse, and ban advertising targeting gender, race, religion, and childhood. Both the Digital Markets Act and Digital Services Act were enacted by the EU in July 2022. The EU defined Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta, and Microsoft as "gatekeepers" under the DMA in September 2023, and required them to comply by March 2024. On June 24, 2024, the European Union charged Apple with breaching the Digital Markets Act, potentially resulting in a significant fine. A final decision is expected by March 2025. The EU is also investigating Apple's new terms and fees for app developers, criticizing the company's restrictions and handling of AI-powered features in the EU.

Alternatives

Alt-tech is a collection of social networking services and Internet service providers popular among the alt-right, far-right, and others who espouse extremism or fringe theories, typically because they employ looser content moderation than mainstream platforms. The term "alt-tech" is a portmanteau of "alt-right" and "Big Tech".

The fediverse is a collection of federated social networking services that can communicate with each other even if they are controlled independently. Users of different websites can send and receive status updates and multimedia files across the network. The term "fediverse" is a portmanteau of "federation" and "universe".

Web3 (also known as Web 3.0) is an idea for a new iteration of the World Wide Web which incorporates concepts such as decentralization, blockchain technologies, and token-based economics. Some technologists and journalists have contrasted it with Web 2.0, in which they claim user-generated content is controlled by a small group of companies referred to as Big Tech.

See also

• Internet portal
• Companies portal

• Criticism of Amazon
• Criticism of Apple Inc.
• Criticism of Facebook
• Criticism of Google
  • DeGoogle
  • Googlization
• Criticism of Microsoft
• Criticism of Tesla, Inc.
• Criticism of technology
• Enshittification
• Platform economy
• Privacy concerns with social networking services
• Surveillance capitalism
• Technology and society
• United States antitrust law
  • Anti-competitive practices
  • Barriers to entry
  • Imperfect competition
  • Market concentration (Duopoly/Oligopoly)
  • Market power
  • Monopolistic competition
  • Monopoly (Natural/Coercive)
• Web3

Notes

1. Data is based on the 2022 Fortune 500.
2. Based on data from the 2022 Fortune 500

References

1. Feller, E., Alphabet Earnings Preview: Tech Titans Battle for AI and Cloud Supremacy, Yahoo! Finance, published on July 18, 2023, accessed on June 22, 2024
2. Oremus, Will (November 17, 2017). "Big Tobacco. Big Pharma. Big Tech?". Slate. Retrieved November 22, 2021.
3. "The Economics of Big Tech". Financial Times. March 29, 2018. Retrieved June 6, 2019.
4. "We're Stuck With the Tech Giants. But They're Stuck With Each Other". New York Times. November 13, 2019. Retrieved April 22, 2020.
5. Birch, Kean; Bronson, Kelly (2022). "Big Tech". Science as Culture. 31 (1). doi:10.1080/09505431.2022.2036118.
6. "Tesla Just Officially Became Big Tech After Surging Beyond $1 Trillion in Market Value". interestingengineering.com. October 25, 2021. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
7. Bergan, Brad. "Tesla Has Officially Become Big Tech After Surging Beyond $1 Trillion in Market Value". www.autobodynews.com. Archived from the original on October 28, 2021. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
8. Levy, Ari (December 31, 2020). "Tech's top seven companies added $3.4 trillion in value in 2020". CNBC. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
9. Researcher, C. Q. (September 14, 2021). Issues for Debate in American Public Policy: Selections from CQ Researcher. CQ Press. ISBN 9781071835258.
10. Hendrickson, Clara; Galston, William A. (May 28, 2019). "Big tech threats: Making sense of the backlash against online platforms". Brookings Institution. Retrieved November 19, 2021.
11. Herrmann, Edward; McChesney, Robert W. (2001), Global Media: The New Missionaries of Global Capitalism, A&C Black, pp. 52–53
12. Edelman, Gilad. "What Is Web3, Anyway?". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Archived from the original on February 10, 2022. Retrieved December 3, 2021.
13. Alford, Harry (September 16, 2021). "Crypto's networked collaboration will drive Web 3.0". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on November 10, 2021. Retrieved November 9, 2021.
14. Khoshafian, Setrag (March 12, 2021). "Can the Real Web 3.0 Please Stand Up?". RTInsights. Archived from the original on March 12, 2021. Retrieved November 9, 2021.
15. Fenwick, Mark and Jurcys, Paulius, The Contested Meaning of Web3 and Why it Matters for (IP) Lawyers (January 27, 2022). Available at SSRN: SSRN 4017790 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4017790
16. Fischer, Sara (September 29, 2020). "Media's failed attempt to take on the Facebook-Google "duopoly"". Axios. Retrieved March 12, 2022.
17. Novet, Jordan (September 26, 2021). "Google is slashing the amount it keeps from sales on its cloud marketplace as pressure mounts on app stores". CNBC. Retrieved October 24, 2021.
18. Gibney, Elizabeth (October 23, 2019). "Hello quantum world! Google publishes landmark quantum supremacy claim". Nature. 574 (7779): 461–462. Bibcode:2019Natur.574..461G. doi:10.1038/d41586-019-03213-z. PMID 31645740. S2CID 204836839.
19. O'Kane, Sean (August 24, 2021). "Waymo starts offering autonomous rides in San Francisco". The Verge. Retrieved March 13, 2022.
20. Elias, Jennifer (January 16, 2020). "Alphabet, Google's parent company, hits trillion-dollar market cap for first time". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
21. Ramkumar, Amrith (January 16, 2020). "Alphabet Becomes Fourth U.S. Company to Reach $1 Trillion Market Value". The Wall Street Journal. News Corp. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
22. "In the 15 years since its launch, Amazon Web Services transformed how companies do business". The Seattle Times. March 13, 2021. Retrieved October 24, 2021.
23. Novet, Jordan (September 5, 2021). "How Amazon's cloud business generates billions in profit". CNBC. Retrieved October 24, 2021.
24. Metz, Cade. "The Cult of Amazon: How a Bookseller Invented the Future of Computing". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved October 24, 2021.
25. Salinas, Sara (September 4, 2018). "Amazon reaches $1 trillion market cap for the first time". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
26. Palmer, Annie (January 31, 2020). "Amazon joins the trillion-dollar club again after knockout earnings report". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
27. Feiner, Lauren (April 14, 2020). "Amazon stock hits a new all-time high as it sees unprecedented demand". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
28. Capoot, Ashley (November 1, 2022). "Amazon sell-off pushes market cap below $1 trillion for first time since April 2020". CNBC. Retrieved November 11, 2022.
29. Palmer, Annie (December 29, 2022). "Amazon lost half its value this year as tech stocks got crushed and recession fears grew". CNBC. Retrieved December 29, 2022.
30. Macheel, Tanaya (May 25, 2023). "Nvidia nears elite trillion-dollar market cap club of Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon". CNBC. Retrieved May 30, 2023.
31. Palmer, Annie (June 26, 2024). "Amazon reaches $2 trillion market cap for the first time". CNBC. Retrieved June 26, 2024.
32. "The 'Big Five' Could Destroy the Tech Ecosystem", Bloomberg.com, November 15, 2017
33. "How 5 Tech Giants Have Become More Like Governments Than Companies", NPR.org, October 26, 2017
34. Salinas, Sara (August 2, 2018). "Apple hangs onto its historic $1 trillion market cap". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
35. "Here's the memo Apple CEO Tim Cook sent to employees after hitting $1 trillion". CNBC. August 3, 2018. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
36. Bursztynsky, Jessica (August 19, 2020). "Apple becomes first U.S. company to reach a $2 trillion market cap". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
37. Leswing, Kif (January 3, 2022). "Apple becomes first U.S. company to reach $3 trillion market cap". CNBC. Retrieved January 3, 2023.
38. Leswing, Kif (January 3, 2023). "Apple's market cap falls under $2 trillion as selloff continues". CNBC. Retrieved January 3, 2023.
39. Field, Hayden (June 30, 2023). "Apple's market cap closes above $3 trillion for the first time". CNBC. Retrieved July 1, 2023.
40. Leswing, Kif (December 5, 2023). "Apple's market cap closes above $3 trillion". CNBC. Retrieved December 5, 2023.
41. Dwoskin, Elizabeth (October 28, 2021). "Facebook is changing its name to Meta as it focuses on the virtual world". The Washington Post. Retrieved October 28, 2021.
42. "Facebook's $2 Billion Acquisition Of Oculus Closes, Now Official". TechCrunch. July 21, 2014. Archived from the original on April 1, 2022. Retrieved October 24, 2021.
43. Rodriguez, Salvador (June 28, 2021). "Facebook closes above $1 trillion market cap for the first time". CNBC. Retrieved November 11, 2022.
44. Vega, Nicolas (December 27, 2021). "Microsoft's market cap grew more than $800 billion in 2021—here's how it compares to the most valuable companies in the world". CNBC. Retrieved November 12, 2022.
45. Rodriguez, Salvador (October 25, 2021). "Facebook shares rise as investors focus on earnings beat and look past whistleblower document dump". CNBC. Retrieved November 12, 2022.
46. Feiner, Lauren (February 2, 2022). "Facebook shares plunge more than 20% on weak earnings, big forecast miss". CNBC. Retrieved November 11, 2022.
47. Feiner, Lauren (February 3, 2022). "Facebook stock plummets 26% in its biggest one-day drop". CNBC. Retrieved November 11, 2022.
48. Sherman, Alex (February 3, 2022). "Facebook's $232 billion fall sets record for largest one-day value drop in stock market history". CNBC. Retrieved November 11, 2022.
49. Feiner, Lauren (February 8, 2022). "Facebook market cap falls below $600 billion – which could actually help it dodge new antitrust scrutiny". CNBC. Retrieved November 12, 2022.
50. Vanian, Jonathan (October 26, 2022). "Meta shares plummet on weak fourth-quarter forecast and earnings miss". CNBC. Retrieved November 11, 2022.
51. Levy, Ari (October 27, 2022). "Facebook used to be a Tech Giant – now Meta isn't even in the top 20 most valuable U.S. companies". CNBC. Retrieved November 11, 2022.
52. Koller, Alex (January 24, 2024). "Meta passes $1 trillion in market cap". CNBC. Retrieved January 24, 2024.
53. "Desktop Operating System Market Share Worldwide, Jan 2020". StatCounter GlobalStats. Archived from the original on January 27, 2020. Retrieved January 27, 2020.
54. "Microsoft 365 Now Boasts Over 50 Million Subscribers". MUO. April 29, 2021. Retrieved December 21, 2021.
55. "Microsoft Teams Now Has Roughly 250 Million Monthly Active Users Globally". News18. July 28, 2021. Retrieved December 21, 2021.
56. Vargas, Cristina (October 25, 2019). "Cloud Market Share 2019: AWS vs Azure vs Google – Who's Winning?". Skyhigh Networks (McAfee). Archived from the original on November 11, 2020. Retrieved January 27, 2020.
57. Levy, Ari (April 25, 2019). "Microsoft hits $1 trillion market cap for the first time as stock jumps on earnings beat". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
58. Duffy, Clare (June 22, 2021). "Microsoft reaches a $2 trillion market cap". CNN Business. CNN. Retrieved January 3, 2023.
59. Novet, Jordan (June 24, 2021). "Microsoft closes above $2 trillion market cap for the first time". CNBC. Retrieved January 3, 2023.
60. Subin, Samantha (October 29, 2021). "Microsoft passes Apple to become the world's most valuable company". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
61. Hum, Robert (October 27, 2022). "The biggest tech stocks have lost $3 trillion in market cap over the last year". CNBC. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
62. Eswaran, Soumya (December 27, 2022). "Will Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) Bounce Back?". Yahoo! News. Yahoo! Inc. Retrieved January 3, 2023.
63. Grant, Charley (January 11, 2024). "Microsoft Dethroned Apple as the Largest U.S. Company—For a Minute". The Wall Street Journal. News Corp. Retrieved January 12, 2024.
64. Capoot, Ashley (January 24, 2024). "Microsoft briefly crosses $3 trillion in market cap". CNBC. Retrieved January 24, 2024.
65. Enderle, Rob (January 18, 2022). "Why NVIDIA Has Become a Leader in the AI Market". Datamation. Archived from the original on May 29, 2022. Retrieved April 11, 2022.
66. Goldman, Sharon (February 23, 2023). "How Nvidia dominated AI — and plans to keep it that way as generative AI explodes". VentureBeat. Archived from the original on March 1, 2023. Retrieved March 1, 2023.
67. "Nvidia: The chip maker that became an AI superpower". May 25, 2023. Archived from the original on December 23, 2023. Retrieved January 2, 2024.
68. "Why everyone is suddenly talking about Nvidia, the nearly $3 trillion-dollar company fueling the AI revolution". NBC News. June 5, 2024. Retrieved June 12, 2024.
69. Goswami, Rohan (May 30, 2023). "Nvidia crosses into $1 trillion market cap before giving back gains". CNBC. Retrieved May 30, 2023.
70. Leswing, Kif (February 13, 2024). "Nvidia is now worth more than Amazon thanks to the AI chip boom". CNBC. Retrieved February 15, 2024.
71. Leswing, Kif (February 14, 2024). "Nvidia passes Alphabet in market cap and is now the third most valuable U.S. company". CNBC. Retrieved February 15, 2024.
72. Leswing, Kif (November 5, 2024). "Nvidia passes Apple as world's most valuable company". CNBC. Retrieved November 5, 2024.
73. "Big Tech stocks weathered the Q1 selloff. Others weren't so lucky". Fortune. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
74. "Tesla is like an 'iPhone on wheels.' And consumers are locked into its ecosystem". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
75. DeBord, Matthew. "Everyone who thinks Tesla is a tech company is completely wrong — Tesla should aspire to be Honda". Business Insider. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
76. Root, Al. "Why Tesla Isn't a Very Good Tech Company". www.barrons.com. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
77. Wilmot, Stephen (January 27, 2022). "Tesla Is a Proven Automaker, an Unproven Tech Giant". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
78. Subin, Samantha (October 25, 2021). "Tesla hits $1 trillion market cap for the first time after Hertz says it will buy 100,000 electric vehicles". CNBC. Retrieved December 29, 2022.
79. Lahiff, Keris (October 25, 2021). "As Tesla joins the elite $1 trillion stock club, two traders see another potential milestone ahead". CNBC. Retrieved December 29, 2022.
80. Bobrowsky, Meghan (December 30, 2022). "Tesla Stock Fell 65% in 2022, Its Biggest-Ever Annual Decline". The Wall Street Journal. News Corp. Retrieved December 30, 2022.
81. Kolodny, Lora (December 14, 2022). "Elon Musk sells another huge chunk of Tesla shares". CNBC. Retrieved December 29, 2022.
82. Goswami, Rohan (December 27, 2022). "Tesla's stock is headed for its worst month, quarter and year on record". CNBC. Retrieved December 29, 2022.
83. Kolodny, Lora (December 28, 2022). "Elon Musk tells Tesla employees don't be 'bothered by stock market craziness'". CNBC. Retrieved December 29, 2022.
84. Palmer, Annie (November 8, 2024). "Tesla hits $1 trillion market cap as stock rallies after Trump win". CNBC. Retrieved November 8, 2024.
85. "Fortune 500". Fortune. Retrieved November 17, 2022.
86. Alexandra S. Levine (February 26, 2021). "Is Twitter angling to become Big Tech?". Politico. Retrieved August 8, 2021.
87. "From Facebook to Twitter, Big Tech sees social commerce driving sales growth". Reuters. July 29, 2021. Retrieved August 8, 2021.
88. Smyrnaios, Nikos (2016). "L'effet GAFAM : stratégies et logiques de l'oligopole de l'internet" [The GAFAM effect: Strategies and logics of the internet oligopoly]. Communication et Langages (in French). 2016 (188). NecPlus: 61–83. doi:10.4074/S0336150016012047. ISSN 0003-5033. Archived from the original on July 13, 2019. Retrieved July 13, 2019.
89. "Why China crushed its tech giants". Wired UK. ISSN 1357-0978. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
90. "China's DJI rebuffs Russian post calling its drones 'symbol of modern warfare'". South China Morning Post. August 15, 2022. Retrieved November 18, 2022.
91. Swisher, Kara (July 1, 2020). "Opinion | Here Come the 4 Horsemen of the Techopolypse". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved August 28, 2020.
92. Galloway, Scott (2017). The Four: The Hidden DNA of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google. Random House Large Print. ISBN 978-0525501220.
93. Schonfeld, Erick (May 31, 2011). "Eric Schmidt's Gang Of Four: Google, Apple, Amazon, And Facebook – TechCrunch". techcrunch.com. Archived from the original on May 30, 2019. Retrieved May 25, 2019.
94. "GAFA Approach to Digital Banking Transformation – Accenture". accenture.com. Archived from the original on March 31, 2022. Retrieved April 23, 2018.
95. Beard, Alison (January 2022). "Can Big Tech Be Disrupted?". Harvard Business Review. Retrieved February 26, 2023.
96. Zuboff, Shoshana (2019). The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power. Profile Books. ISBN 978-1781256855.
97. Simon, Phil (October 22, 2011). The Age of the Platform: How Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google Have Redefined Business (1 ed.). Motion Publishing. p. 312. ISBN 9780982930250.
98. Galloway, Scott (2017). The Four: The Hidden DNA of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google. Random House. ISBN 9781473542105.
99. "Eric Schmidt's "Gang Of Four" Doesn't Have Room for Microsoft". AllThingsD.
100. "Eric Schmidt is stepping down as the executive chairman of Alphabet". CNBC. December 21, 2017.
101. Waters, Richard (July 27, 2018). "Move over Faangs, make way for Maga". Financial Times. Retrieved November 18, 2018.
102. Stankiewicz, Kevin (October 29, 2021). "'Bye-bye FAANG, hello MAMAA'—Cramer reveals a new acronym after Facebook's name change". CNBC. Retrieved October 30, 2021.
103. "Fortune 500". Fortune. Retrieved November 17, 2022.
104. Stevens, Pippa (April 26, 2019). "Four 'MAGA' stocks are worth a combined $4 trillion. Here's the one to own, say two experts". CNBC. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved January 27, 2020.
105. "Move over FAANG, here comes MAGA – The tech giants are still in rude health". The Economist. August 4, 2018. Retrieved January 27, 2020.
106. 김제림 (Kim Je-rim) (May 29, 2019). "'FAANG' 지고 'MAGA' 시대 온다 ("FAANG" is losing and "MAGA" is coming)". 매일경제 (in Korean). Retrieved January 27, 2020.
107. Khan, Kim (December 22, 2021). "Defining 'tech stocks': GAMMA stocks dominate". Seeking Alpha.
108. "Most Valuable Companies in the World – 2020". FXSSI – Forex Sentiment Board. Archived from the original on January 27, 2020. Retrieved January 27, 2020.
109. Balu, Nivedita (January 3, 2022). "Apple becomes first company to hit $3 trillion market value, then slips". Reuters. Retrieved January 3, 2022.
110. Singh, Hardika (March 22, 2023). "Apple, Microsoft Dominate U.S. Markets After FAANG Trade Fizzles". The Wall Street Journal. News Corp. Retrieved March 22, 2023.
111. "Top Companies 2021: The 50 best workplaces to grow your career in the U.S." linkedin.com. Retrieved October 5, 2021.
112. Bariso, Justin (May 30, 2021). "Life at Google vs. Life at Amazon: From Hiring to Firing (and Everything in Between)". Inc.com. Retrieved October 5, 2021.
113. Jackson, Abby. "14 things that are harder to get into than Harvard". Business Insider. Retrieved April 3, 2022.
114. Jason Paul Whittaker (February 11, 2019), "Introduction", Tech Giants, Artificial Intelligence, and the Future of Journalism (Open Access), Routledge
115. Krauskopf, Lewis (December 29, 2023). "Can sizzling Magnificent Seven trade keep powering US stocks in 2024?". Reuters. Retrieved February 27, 2024.
116. Smith, Elliot (February 19, 2024). "Magnificent 7 profits now exceed almost every country in the world. Should we be worried?". CNBC. Retrieved February 19, 2024.
117. "The 'Magnificent Seven' tech stocks drive markets higher as AI mania grips investors". Yahoo Finance. May 30, 2023. Retrieved February 28, 2024.
118. Russell, Karl; Rennison, Joe (January 22, 2024). "These Seven Tech Stocks Are Driving the Market". The New York Times. Retrieved February 27, 2024.
119. Cingari, Piero. "Magnificent 7 Eye $13-Trillion Market Cap: 'They Are Sucking All The Air Out Of The Universe,' Wall Street Veteran Says – Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN)". Benzinga. Retrieved February 28, 2024.
120. Iacurci, Greg (July 1, 2024). "Is the U.S. stock market too 'concentrated'? Here's what to know". CNBC. Retrieved July 1, 2024.
121. Goswami, Rohan; Levy, Ari (August 5, 2024). "$1 trillion wipeout: Market rout punishes megacap tech". CNBC. Retrieved August 5, 2024.
122. "What are the Four Big Tech Companies in the US?". WorldAtlas. October 24, 2019. Retrieved January 27, 2020.
123. Brodie, Lee (February 5, 2013). "Cramer: Does Your Portfolio Have FANGs?". CNBC. Retrieved November 9, 2021.
124. Grant, Kinsey (September 26, 2017). "FANG Stocks Are Getting Their Own Index". The Street.
125. Frankel, Matthew (September 29, 2017). "What Are the FANG Stocks?". Motley Fool. Retrieved August 11, 2018.
126. Gurdus, Lizzy (May 1, 2017). "Cramer: Disney, Apple and the fate of FANG". CNBC. Retrieved November 9, 2021.
127. Mann, Bill (November 5, 2021). "FAANG is Dead. Long Live MANAMANA". The Motley Fool. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
128. Sterling, Bruce (March 15, 2019). "The Big Nine G-MAFIA BAT". Wired. Retrieved August 10, 2019.
129. Grossman, Wendy M. "The Twenty-Six Words that Created the Internet, book review: The biography of a law". ZDNet. Retrieved September 4, 2020.
130. Dippon, Christian (2017). Economic Value of Internet Intermediaries and the Role of Liability Protections (PDF) (Report). NERA Economic Consulting. Retrieved May 30, 2020 – via Internet Association.
131. Robertson, Adi (February 8, 2021). "Section 230 Is 25 Years Old, And It's Never Been More Important". The Verge. Retrieved November 20, 2021.
132. Madrigal, Alexis C. (January 15, 2020). "Silicon Valley Abandons the Culture That Made It the Envy of the World". The Atlantic. Retrieved December 20, 2023.
133. Molla, Rani (April 9, 2018). "Amazon spent nearly $23 billion on R&D last year—more than any other U.S. company". Vox. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
134. "'It's just the beginning': Covid push to digital boosts big tech profits". the Guardian. May 1, 2021. Retrieved October 24, 2021.
135. "Why tech industry monopolies could be a 'curse' for society". PBS NewsHour. January 17, 2019. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
136. Wu, Tim (July 16, 2019). "Where New Industries Get Their Start: Rebooting the Startup Economy" (PDF). House of Representatives. Archived (PDF) from the original on December 21, 2019.
137. Kennedy, Joe (November 9, 2020). "Monopoly Myths: Is Big Tech Creating "Kill Zones"?".
138. Haroun, Chris (April 10, 2014). "Fighting the Big Fight: What the Cloud Wars Mean for Netflix, Spotify, Airbnb". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved November 24, 2021.
139. "Tech giants fight 'cloud wars' deep in the ocean". BBC News. May 24, 2021. Retrieved November 24, 2021.
140. Apple, Google and a Deal That Controls the Internet The New York Times, 2020
141. "The rules of the tech game are changing". The Economist. February 27, 2021. ISSN 0013-0613. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
142. Horgan, John (October 7, 2020). "Big Tech, Out-of-Control Capitalism and the End of Civilization". Scientific American. Archived from the original on October 8, 2020. Retrieved January 6, 2022.
143. Kingwell, Mark (January 7, 2022). "Opinion: Might the left and right unite in their shared hatred of Big Tech?". The Globe and Mail. Retrieved March 5, 2022.
144. Manjoo, Farhad (May 19, 2022). "Regulating Online Speech Can Be a Terrible Idea". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved May 19, 2022.
145. Thayer, Joel (February 28, 2022). "The damnable religious inklings of the Big Tech libertarian". The Hill. Retrieved June 12, 2022.
146. Pisani, Bob (October 3, 2017). "We are letting Amazon and Apple 'avoid taxes, invade privacy, and destroy jobs,' says NYU professor". CNBC.
147. McCullagh, Declan (February 2019). "Deplatforming Is a Dangerous Game". Reason. Archived from the original on March 31, 2019.
148. "Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google grilled on Capitol Hill over their market power". Washington Post. July 29, 2020. Retrieved August 28, 2021.
149. Breland, Ali. "In attacking Amazon, Matt Gaetz boosts a terrorist organization". Mother Jones. Retrieved August 28, 2021.
150. "Trump Blames 'Big Media, Big Tech' as he Rails Against Election 'Fraud' Without Evidence". Washington Times. November 5, 2020. Retrieved January 12, 2021.
151. "This is what Trump told supporters before many stormed Capitol Hill". ABC News. Retrieved January 10, 2021. The fake news and the big tech, big tech, is now coming into their own. We beat them four years ago, we surprised them. We took him by surprise and this year they rigged an election, they rigged it like they have never rigged an election before, and by the way, last night, they didn't do a bad job either, if you notice. I am honest, and I just again, I want to thank you. It's just a great honor to have this kind of crowd and to be before you and hundreds of thousands of American patriots who are committed to the honesty of our elections and the integrity of our glorious Republic.
152. "Angela Merkel finds Twitter's block on Trump's account 'problematic'". The Daily Telegraph. Agence France-Presse. January 11, 2021. Retrieved January 12, 2021.
153. "'Problematic': Germany's Angela Merkel calls out Twitter over Trump ban". Global News. January 11, 2021. Retrieved January 12, 2021.
154. "Analysis | The Technology 202: New report calls conservative claims of social media censorship 'a form of disinformation'". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved August 28, 2021.
155. "Tech – Bias Report 2021". NYU Stern Center for Business and Human Rights. Retrieved August 28, 2021.
156. Tiffany, Kaitlyn (April 28, 2022). "Why Hunter Biden's Laptop Will Never Go Away". The Atlantic. Retrieved June 2, 2022.
157. "Hunter Biden laptop confirmation proves Big Tech's bias". Washington Examiner. May 31, 2022. Retrieved June 2, 2022.
158. Justin Baragona, Adam Rawnsley (June 28, 2021). "YouTube Bans and Then Unbans Right Wing Watch, a Media Watchdog Devoted to Exposing Right-Wing Conspiracies". The Daily Beast. Retrieved November 11, 2021.
159. "Big Tech's Heavy Hand Around the Globe". Human Rights Watch. September 8, 2020. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
160. Kelly, Makena (March 11, 2019). "Facebook proves Elizabeth Warren's point by deleting her ads about breaking up Facebook". The Verge. Retrieved November 11, 2021.
161. Feiner, Lauren (March 12, 2019). "Elizabeth Warren says Facebook proved her point that it has too much power by removing her ads". CNBC. Retrieved November 11, 2021.
162. Yun Chee, Foo (January 20, 2025). "Facebook, X, YouTube to do more against online hate speech, EU says". Reuters. Retrieved January 21, 2025.
163. Seetharaman, Deepa (November 15, 2018). "Facebook Says Criticism of Its Russia Response Is 'Unfair'". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
164. Illing, Sean (October 16, 2017). "Cambridge Analytica, the shady data firm that might be a key Trump-Russia link, explained". Vox. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
165. Wells, Georgia; McMillan, Robert; Volz, Dustin (October 8, 2019). "Senate Faults Google, Other Tech Giants for Role in Russian Election Meddling". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
166. Roose, Kevin; Frenkel, Sheera; Perlroth, Nicole (March 29, 2020). "Tech Giants Prepared for 2016-Style Meddling. But the Threat Has Changed". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
167. "YouTube says it's getting better at taking down videos that break its rules. They still number in the millions". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
168. Bond, Shannon (March 16, 2021). "'Ya Basta Facebook' Says Company Must Curb Misinformation In Spanish". NPR.org. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
169. "Just 12 People Are Behind Most Vaccine Hoaxes On Social Media, Research Shows". NPR.org. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
170. "E&C Committee Announces Hearing with Tech CEOs on the Misinformation and Disinformation Plaguing Online Platforms". Democrats, Energy and Commerce Committee. February 18, 2021. Archived from the original on April 18, 2022. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
171. "Google, Facebook Twitter grilled in US on fake news". BBC News. March 25, 2021. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
172. "Biden softens criticism of Facebook after accusing company of 'killing people'". NBC News. July 19, 2021. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
173. Silverman, Jacob; Noah, Timothy; Noah, Timothy; Ford, Matt; Ford, Matt; Segers, Grace; Segers, Grace; Konczal, Mike; Sterling, Steph (July 19, 2021). "Facebook Is Designed to Spread Covid Misinformation". The New Republic. ISSN 0028-6583. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
174. "Defying rules, anti-vaccine accounts thrive on social media". AP NEWS. April 20, 2021. Retrieved August 6, 2021.
175. "Apple, Google raise new concerns by yanking Russian app". AP NEWS. September 22, 2021. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
176. Leskin, Paige. "Here are all the major US tech companies blocked behind China's 'Great Firewall'". Business Insider. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
177. "Farmers' protest page was flagged as spam, clarifies Facebook a day after blocking account". Scroll.in. December 21, 2020. Retrieved December 5, 2021.
178. Singh, Karan Deep (February 10, 2021). "Twitter Blocks Accounts in India as Modi Pressures Social Media". New York Times. Retrieved December 5, 2021.
179. "Facebook did not ban Bajrang Dal due to concern for employees' safety, business prospects: Report". Scroll.in. December 14, 2020. Retrieved December 5, 2021.
180. "Russia blocks access to Facebook and Twitter". the Guardian. March 4, 2022. Retrieved March 6, 2022.
181. "Russia labels Meta an 'extremist organization', says WhatsApp can stay". Financial Post. March 21, 2022.
182. "Facebook, Google others face higher fines in Russia as Kremlin cracks down". South China Morning Post. September 21, 2021. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
183. "Supply Change - Climate commitments and renewable energy progress by consumer electronics brands and their top suppliers" (PDF). Greenpeace / Stand.earth. 2022.
184. Calma, Justine (October 16, 2023). "Apple has an edge over its competitors in the fight against climate change". The Verge. Retrieved April 24, 2024.
185. Hale, Craig (July 15, 2024). "Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries". TechRadar.
186. Bougon, François (May 21, 2019). "Face aux Gafam, les députés adoptent le droit voisin" [Members of Parliament pass a related rights law against GAFAM] (in French). Le Monde. Archived from the original on May 25, 2019. Retrieved May 26, 2019.
187. Rey, Jason Del (February 6, 2020). "Why Congress's antitrust investigation should make Big Tech nervous". Vox. Retrieved February 21, 2020.
188. PYMNTS (December 11, 2019). "DOJ To Wrap Up Probe Into Big Tech In 2020". PYMNTS.com. Retrieved February 21, 2020.
189. GmbH, finanzen net. "The DOJ's latest probe erased $33 billion from Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google | Markets Insider". markets.businessinsider.com. Archived from the original on November 27, 2021. Retrieved February 21, 2020.
190. "Is Margrethe Vestager championing consumers or her political career?". The Economist. September 14, 2017. Retrieved June 26, 2020.
191. Boskin, Michael (April 29, 2019), "Privacy, power and censorship: how to regulate big tech", The Guardian
192. "It's almost impossible to function without the big five tech giants | John Naughton". the Guardian. February 17, 2019. Retrieved April 23, 2021.
193. "Why the Consumer Welfare Standard Should Remain the Bedrock of Antitrust Policy" (PDF). Information Technology & Innovation Foundation. October 5, 2018.
194. "Investment Heroes 2019: Boosting U.S. Growth". Progressive Policy. December 12, 2019. Archived from the original on June 21, 2020. Retrieved June 12, 2020.
195. PAGE, William; CHILDERS, Seldon (2007). Software Development as an Antitrust Remedy: Lessons from the Enforcement of the Microsoft Communications Protocol Licensing Requirement. Retrieved September 26, 2022.
196. "FTC to Examine Past Acquisitions by Large Technology Companies". Federal Trade Commission. February 11, 2020.
197. "FTC's Bureau of Competition Launches Task Force to Monitor Technology Markets". Federal Trade Commission. February 26, 2019.
198. Yglesias, Matthew (May 3, 2019), The push to break up Big Tech, explained
199. Cox, Kate (January 9, 2021). "House: Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Google have "monopoly power," should be split". Ars Technica. Retrieved January 9, 2021.
200. Investigation of Competition in Digital Markets (PDF) (Report). United States House of Representatives. January 2021.
201. Chairman Nadler's Statement for the markup of H.R.3825 (Report). United States House of Representatives. June 2021.
202. How lower pricing could make for an Antitrust case against Amazon (Report). May 2019.
203. Breuninger, Kevin; Feiner, Lauren (July 9, 2021). "Biden signs order to crack down on Big Tech, boost competition 'across the board'". CNBC. Retrieved July 9, 2021.
204. Sullivan, Kate; Fung, Brian; Klein, Betsy (July 9, 2021). "Biden signs sweeping executive order that targets Big Tech and aims to push competition in US economy". CNN. Retrieved July 9, 2021.
205. McCabe, David (June 5, 2024). "U.S. Clears Way for Antitrust Inquiries of Nvidia, Microsoft and OpenAI". The New York Times. Retrieved June 6, 2024.
206. Field, Hayden; Javers, Eamon (June 6, 2024). "U.S. regulators to open antitrust probes into Nvidia, Microsoft and OpenAI". CNBC. Retrieved June 6, 2024.
207. Goswami, Rohan; Elias, Jennifer (August 5, 2024). "Google loses antitrust case over search". CNBC. Retrieved August 5, 2024.
208. Kruppa, Miles; Wolfe, Jan (August 5, 2024). "Google Loses Antitrust Case Over Search-Engine Dominance". The Wall Street Journal. News Corp. Retrieved August 5, 2024.
209. The Verge, June 16, 2020 EU Opens Apple Antitrust Investigations into App Store and Apple Pay practices
210. Open Markets Institute, The Corner Newsletter, June 25, 2020, Open Markets Examines the European Commission's Newly Announced Investigation into Potentially Anti-competitive Practices by Apple
211. Parliament of the European Union, Hearing of Margrethe Vestager 8 Oct. 2019 p. 28
212. Bose, Nandita (September 23, 2021). "EXCLUSIVE Big Tech targeted by U.S. and EU in draft memo ahead of tech and trade meeting". Reuters. Retrieved September 29, 2021.
213. Satariano, Adam (March 24, 2022). "E.U. Takes Aim at Big Tech's Power With Landmark Digital Act". The New York Times. Retrieved March 24, 2022.
214. Bell, Karissa (March 24, 2022). "European Union reaches provisional agreement on antitrust law targeting tech giants". Engadget. Retrieved March 24, 2022.
215. Browne, Ryan (April 22, 2022). "EU agrees on landmark law aimed at forcing Big Tech firms to tackle illegal content". CNBC. Retrieved April 22, 2022.
216. Chee, Foo Yun (July 5, 2022). "EU lawmakers pass landmark tech rules, but enforcement a worry". Reuters. Retrieved July 5, 2022.
217. Holt, Kris (September 7, 2023). "EU confirms the six tech giants subject to its strict new competition laws". Engadget.
218. Yun Chee, Foo (June 24, 2024). "Apple charged with breaching EU tech rules, faces another probe". Reuters. Retrieved June 24, 2024.
219. Freelon, Deen; Marwick, Alice; Kreiss, Daniel (September 4, 2020). "False equivalencies: Online activism from left to right". Science. 369 (6508): 1197–1201. Bibcode:2020Sci...369.1197F. doi:10.1126/science.abb2428. ISSN 0036-8075. PMID 32883863. S2CID 221471947. Archived from the original on September 4, 2020. Retrieved September 5, 2020. (freely available version)
220. Andrews, Frank; Pym, Ambrose (February 24, 2021). "The Websites Sustaining Britain's Far-Right Influencers". Bellingcat. Archived from the original on February 24, 2021. Retrieved February 25, 2021.
221. "Definition of fediverse". PCMAG. Retrieved April 3, 2024.
222. Mak, Aaron (November 9, 2021). "What Is Web3 and Why Are All the Crypto People Suddenly Talking About It?". Slate. Archived from the original on November 9, 2021. Retrieved November 9, 2021.

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to Big Tech.

• How Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google manipulate our emotions – Scott Galloway at TED
• "In the Age of AI". FRONTLINE. Season 38. Episode 6. November 5, 2019. PBS. WGBH. Retrieved June 4, 2023.