TikTok banned on government devices under spending bill passed by Congress

TL;DR

Center-left tech industry group Chamber of Progress cheered the exclusion of several antitrust bills that would have targeted its backers, which include Apple, Amazon, Google and Meta."What you don't see in this year's omnibus are the more controversial measures that have raised red flags on issues like content moderation," Chamber of Progress CEO Adam Kovacevich said in a statement following the release of the package text earlier this week.Though Amazon initially opposed the bill last year, writing that it was "pushed by some big-box retailers" and claiming it would punish small businesses that sell online, the company ended up supporting a version of the bill, saying it was important to have a federal standard rather than a patchwork of state laws.Etsy's head of Americas advocacy and public policy, Jeffrey Zubricki, said in a statement the bill "will achieve our shared goal of protecting consumers from bad actors while avoiding overly broad disclosure requirements that would harm our sellers' privacy and hinder their ability to run their creative businesses."The measure is meant to help fund the Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice Antitrust Division, which have seen a large uptick in merger filings over the past few years without adequate budget increases."

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