Big Tech is finally getting the scrutiny it deserves. The Federal Trade Commission and 46 state attorneys general are suing Facebook for anti-competitive conduct; the Department of Justice has brought a case against Google, challenging its dominance in search engines; ten Republican attorneys general are suing Google over its ad technology practices. These are important efforts to rein in Big Tech’s economic advantages, but the global technology giants’ increasing harm to our health has not yet attracted the attention it warrants.
As the world struggles to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, address the climate emergency, and manage the rising anxiety and depression triggered by our increasingly stress-filled lives, new strategies to reduce the health burdens imposed by companies like Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft (known as GAFAM) are urgently needed. Read more in this NY Daily News Op Ed by Nicholas Freudenberg, author of At What Cost Modern Capitalism and the Future of Health (Oxford University Press, 2021).
Corporations and Health Watch 