CHINA
Lawmakers on both sides peppered Pichai with questions about the possibility that Google is considering offering a censored search engine in China after pulling out of that country in 2010 in a high-profile dispute with its communist government’s policies.
It’s not clear what Congress might be able to do to prevent Google from returning to China, but it would certainly trigger more political fireworks.
Pichai acknowledged Google has been exploring a possible search engine in China with a team of engineers that at times has exceeded 100 people, but repeatedly emphasized the company has no plans to release it “right now.” If that changes, Pichai promised let lawmakers know about it.
ELECTION INTERFERENCE
While Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee grilled Pichai on what they perceive as bias against conservatives, top committee Democrat Jerrold Nadler said lawmakers should instead examine issues such as the spread of misinformation online and Russian efforts to influence U.S. elections online.
Given Democrats are poised to take over the House, the use of fake news and misinformation by foreign actors — especially Russia — will likely to continue to be front and center in the coming months, if not years.
BREAKING UP IS HARD TO DO
Governments around the world are becoming increasingly unnerved by the power being amassed by major technology companies — with the dominance of Facebook in social networking, Google in search and Amazon in e-commerce raising the most concerns.
That has raised the specter that Trump and Congress might turn up the heat on antitrust regulators to get them to investigate whether consumers and the economy as a whole need to be protected from those companies.
In the most dramatic scenario, a case might be made for breaking the companies into smaller pieces. The premise would be that they have become modern-day trusts similar to what John Rockefeller built through Standard Oil, before the U.S. Supreme Court required it to be dismantled in a 1911 decision that reshaped the business landscape.