CNBC: TikTok banned on government devices under spending bill passed by Congress
Under the bipartisan spending bill that passed both chambers of Congress on Friday, TikTok will be banned from government devices, underscoring the growing concern about the popular video-sharing app owned by China’s ByteDance.
The bill, which still has to be signed into law by President Joe Biden, also calls on e-commerce platforms to do more vetting to help deter counterfeit goods from being sold online, and forces companies pursuing large mergers to pay more to file with federal antitrust agencies.
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Higher fees for big mergers
While more ambitious antitrust measures targeting digital platforms didn’t make it into the end-of-year legislation, there is one bill to help raise money for the antitrust agencies that scrutinize mergers. The Merger Filing Fee Modernization Act will raise the cost companies pursuing large mergers must pay to file with the antitrust agencies, as they’re required to do under the law. The bill also lowers the cost for smaller deals and allows the fees to be adjusted each year based on the consumer price index.
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.
While it fell short of antitrust advocates’ hopes, the inclusion of the merger filing fee bill still gained praise.
“This is a major milestone for the anti-monopoly movement,” said Sarah Miller, executive director of the American Economic Liberties Project, backed in part by the Omidyar Network. Miller said the bill will “significantly strengthen antitrust law for the first time since 1976.”
“Big Tech, Big Ag and Big Pharma spent extraordinary sums in an unprecedented effort to keep Congress from delivering on antitrust reform and undermine the ability of state and federal enforcers to uphold the law — and they lost,” Miller added.
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