Amnesty International dropped a bombshell today with their "Breaking up with Big Tech" briefing, calling for governments to literally break up Google, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, and Apple. About fucking time someone with real credibility said what antitrust nerds have been screaming for years.
Hannah Storey, their tech policy adviser, nailed it: "These few companies act as digital landlords who determine the shape and form of our online interaction." That's not hyperbole - it's the truth that everyone's been dancing around while these companies consolidated control over basically everything we do online.
The Human Rights Angle That Changes Everything
What makes this different from typical antitrust complaints is the human rights framework. Amnesty isn't just whining about market concentration - they're documenting actual harm to privacy rights, freedom of expression, and access to information. They've got receipts from their investigations into Facebook's role in ethnic cleansing in Myanmar and violence in Ethiopia's Tigray war.
This isn't theoretical anymore. When a single company's algorithm decisions can fuel genocide, we're way past the point of "let the market sort it out." I've been covering tech policy for years, and I've never seen such a direct connection drawn between monopoly power and human rights violations.
The briefing specifically calls out how these platforms have become so embedded in daily life that "meaningful participation in society now depends on using their services." That's not capitalism - that's feudalism with Wi-Fi.
The AI Power Grab That Nobody's Stopping
Amnesty also highlights something everyone's ignoring - these same companies are now racing to dominate AI. Google's AI investments, Microsoft's OpenAI partnership, Meta's AI research, Amazon's AI services, and Apple's machine learning are all positioning themselves to control the infrastructure that will power artificial intelligence for the next decade.
I've watched this playbook before. First they become indispensable for basic internet services, then they leverage that dominance into adjacent markets. Now they're doing it with AI, and governments are just sitting back and watching it happen.
The briefing specifically calls for investigating "the emerging generative AI sector to establish human rights risks and impacts from anticompetitive practices." Translation: stop these bastards before they own AI too.
Why Government Regulation Has Failed So Far
Here's what pisses me off about the current regulatory approach - it's all theater. The EU's Digital Services Act, the U.S. antitrust investigations, all the congressional hearings where tech CEOs show up and lie for five hours - none of it has meaningfully changed these companies' market power. Previous antitrust efforts have been largely toothless.
Amnesty's calling for something different: using human rights law as the basis for antitrust action. Instead of just looking at market share and pricing, regulators would have to consider whether a company's dominance harms fundamental rights.
This could actually work because human rights violations are harder to dismiss than economic theory arguments. When Facebook's algorithms promote hate speech that leads to real violence, that's not just a market failure - it's a human rights catastrophe.
The Responses That Tell You Everything
Amnesty contacted all five companies before publishing. Only Microsoft and Meta bothered to respond. Google, Amazon, and Apple couldn't even be bothered to engage with a human rights organization questioning their business practices.
That arrogance tells you everything you need to know about how these companies view accountability. They're so confident in their market positions that they don't think they need to justify their actions to anyone.
What This Actually Means for Tech Policy
This briefing could be a turning point because it reframes the entire debate. Instead of arguing about economic efficiency or innovation incentives, we're talking about whether it's acceptable for a handful of companies to control the infrastructure of human communication.
The recommended actions are specific and actionable:
- Investigate Big Tech for human rights harm from anti-competitive practices
- Break up companies whose monopoly power harms human rights
- Block mergers that risk human rights violations
- Integrate human rights considerations into antitrust decisions
I've seen enough regulatory capture in my career to be skeptical, but the human rights angle could bypass the usual industry lobbying. It's harder to argue that your right to monopolize markets trumps other people's right to privacy and free expression.
The real test will be whether any government has the balls to actually use these recommendations. Because breaking up Big Tech isn't just an economic policy decision anymore - it's a human rights imperative.
And honestly, it's about time someone with Amnesty's credibility said that out loud.