Google, Facebook and Amazon use their size, range and technology skills to help Americans overcome the crisis coronavirus, a chance for Big Tech to counter criticism drums in Washington.The three companies have the opportunity to polish their image amid intense regulatory scrutiny by the United States Department of Justice, federal Trade Commission, state attorneys House Judiciary Committee, who accused the company of engaging in anti-competitive behavior by using their power to maintain market share or expand into adjacent markets and the public.
Washington lawmakers from both sides regularly attacked the company with a variety of charges, of doing too little to protect children to help hucksters who used to rip the coronavirus outbreak.
But pandemic coronavirus has been offering companies, which all hold sizeable cash reserves and has the outsized capacity to influence American life, the opportunity to play the role of savior temporarily set aside harpy profiteering image data.
“I’m glad that they are willing to help,” Senator Josh Hawley, a Republican, said Google’s efforts to develop a filtering mechanism for the virus. “I hope that they really help and do not use this as an opportunity to drum up business.”
Facebook Inc. is the latest company to announce it wants to help limit the economic damage of the coronavirus on Tuesday when it said it would provide $ 100 million in cash grants and advertising credits for up to 30,000 small businesses in more than 30 countries.
Alphabet Inc. Google the first out of the gate last weekend, received high praise from President Donald Trump to develop a web site to help speed up the process of finding that requires tests coronavirus.
Then Amazon.com Inc., whose founder Jeff Bezos has regular contact with the White House staff in recent days, on Monday said it will employ 100,000 workers in the warehouse and shipping the United States to handle the surge in online orders. Amazon also said it would add $ 2 to $ 15 per hour minimum wage for US workers until April.
Scott Wallsten, president of the Technology Policy Institute, which counts all three companies among its members, said that the current environment offers the opportunity to reset how people think about technology and will “add a new dimension” to the debate about how great technology painful competition.
Bhaskar Chakravorti, Dean of Global Business at The Fletcher School, Tufts University, who has tracked the effect of digital technology on issues such as global health and economic development, said the focus has shifted to how large technology companies are stepping up to fight against misinformation and facilitate ” much social economy. ”
“We not only get information about the public health situation but we are trying to emulate some semblance of an online business with their help,” he said.
