(PatriotWise.com) – Last year, Congress passed five pieces of legislation related to Big Tech.
In July, lawmakers passed the CHIPS Act, taking a significant step toward curtailing America’s reliance on China for computer chips.
The CHIPS Act provides tens of billions of dollars to manufacturers to build semiconductor plants in the United States. Since the bill became law, several semiconductor companies have begun to build new plants in Arizona, New York, and Ohio.
As part of the massive $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill passed in late December, Congress passed a measure to ban the use of TikTok on government devices.
Washington has grown increasingly critical of the video-sharing social media platform over the links its parent company, the Chinese-based ByteDance, has with the Chinese Communist Party and reports that Beijing officials can access the user data of Americans.
A bill to ban TikTok from the US entirely failed to gain traction in Congress last year.
Congress also passed the INFORM Consumers Act which forces online marketplaces to gather personal identifying information from online sellers. By collecting this data, online retailers will be able to combat online sellers who are selling stolen products. The bill was favored by online retailers who are facing a theft wave.
The House approved the INFORM Consumers Act in November and it was included in the $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill.
Also included in the omnibus spending bill was the Merger Filing Fee Modernization Act. This legislation updated the filing fees for mergers, giving anti-trust regulators more funding and tools to control what entities can merge or acquire other companies.
Finally, in November, the Safe Connections Act was signed into law. This small piece of legislation allows victims of domestic abuse to ask phone providers to easily separate their phone lines from those of their spouses or partners if their spouse or partner is abusive or controlling.
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