Fortune 500 CEOs join politicians in calling for Facebook regulation

Industry Contributor 18 May 2019 - 3 min read

Fortune 500 CEOs join politicians in calling for Facebook regulation

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Tags: facebook, regulation, data, marketing, advertising, privacy, federal trade commission, social media. data

Half of the chief executives of the 500 biggest companies in America believe Facebook should be more closely regulated. The news comes as U.S. politicians ramp up calls for Facebook to be broken up (The Hill).

Key points:

Half of Fortune 500 company CEOs said in a new survey that Facebook needs additional regulation.
41% of the CEOs favour additional regulation of Amazon, and 39% of Alphabet. Only 6% for Apple
“It is unclear — and, frankly, baffling — why the FTC [Federal Trade Commission] is still refusing to act. If they want to retain a shred of public trust, they need to act now and break up Facebook.” - Sarah Miller, Freedom from Facebook campaign
Republican and Democrat Senators call for regulators to go beyond $5bn mooted fine for privacy breaches and enforce change on Facebook's data collection, tracking and advertising practices

Marketers relying on cheap social reach need to keep a close watch on developments. The advertising industry as we know it is coming under increasing threat. Not just from politicians, but big business too.

Fortune 500 companies represent two thirds of U.S. GDP with revenues totalling $13.7 trillion. To be clear, they are not actually calling for Facebook to be broken up, though a lot of companies on the Fortune 500 list would stand to gain from that development, but that’s $7tn worth of heft telling U.S. lawmakers to ensure Facebook is more tightly regulated.

Politicians are amping up the pressure on the Federal Trade Commission to go beyond a $5bn fine for Facebook over data and privacy breaches. Two senators on the subcommittee that overseas the FTC have slammed the mooted fine as a slap on the wrist. In a letter earlier this month, they called for a much higher fine and for the FTC to legislate “sweeping changes”, around data collection, tracking and sharing between Facebook's platforms and “curbing advertising practices”.

Meanwhile, those bidding for the presidential nomination, including Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden are increasingly aligning with the views of Elizabeth Warren.

The feelings of U.S. businesses however, do not appear to be reflected locally. Australian marketers and industry execs have flocked to join a new Facebook Australian podcast series and TV network CEOs this week joined the major sporting codes at Facebook's Barangaroo HQ. Something of a disconnect.