#big-tech

#big-tech

As far as I was concerned, Australia's world-first social media law aimed at preventing children under 16 from accessing social media apps was already a success. But this week, as the ban took effect, my son wasn't so sure. Access to his accounts remained largely unchanged. Many of his friends were in the same position. Across the country, the rollout has been uneven, as social media companies try to work out how to verify kids' ages.

Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging. At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story. The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls.

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

Look, what we have seen, Bill, is that tech companies care about one thing, and that's their bottom line. Time and time again, we have exposed what they are doing to children, what these algorithms do. Look, the data speaks for itself. Bill, I know that you have taken a look at this, but one in three high school young women last year said she actually considered death by suicide.

He's taking 25% of the money he previously invested in S&P 500 index funds-a meaningful chunk for a self-made millionaire -and moving it into a more diversified set of assets, including: S&P 500 value index funds, which tilt toward companies with lower valuations and less AI-driven hype. Mid-cap stocks, which he believes could benefit if smaller firms catch more of AI's productivity gains. International index funds, offering exposure outside the U.S. tech-heavy market.

On this week's podcast: How Australia will ban under-16s from social media Photographer: Brendon Thorne/Bloomberg Never miss an episode. Follow The Bloomberg Australia Podcast today. From next week, Australia's under-16s will be prevented from accessing platforms including TikTok, Snapchat and Facebook, as the Labor government pushes to curb harms caused by social media. In our latest podcast, Rebecca Jones asks Bloomberg's Angus Whitley

For two decades, the playbook for Big Tech was fairly simple and extremely successful: Create disruptive innovations, deliver blinding growth rates and keep a lid on spending. A handful of behemoths like Alphabet Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Meta Platforms Inc. and Microsoft Corp. used this formula to seize market share from legacy businesses and power the US stock market to record after record.

Big Tech and other superstars of the U.S. stock market are rallying on Monday, as Wall Street recovers most of its loss from last week. The S&P 500 climbed 1.3% to claw back three-quarters of its drop from last week, which was its first weekly loss in four. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 245 points, or 0.5%, as of 1:15 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 2.1% higher. Nvidia was by far the strongest force lifting the market and rallied 4.8%.

President Donald Trump's "Big Beautiful Bill" is handing out billions in tax breaks, and a new analysis from Senator Elizabeth Warren's (D-MA) office is demonstrating just how substantial those sums are. Under the law, Google's parent company, Alphabet, will save around $17.9 billion in taxes this year, an amount that Warren's office found could've paid for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits for 7.5 million Americans.

We need to take a deep breath and understand it's like a meteor coming,

Since the start of 2025, many prominent big tech companies have publicly scaled back their DEI programs, in response to shifting requirements by the US government. Within days of taking office, President Trump signed an executive order prohibiting diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies within federal departments and sending a message and demanded civil investigations into companies that have such programs in place.

Amazon led the way after jumping 10.3%. The retail giant was by far the strongest force pushing upward on the market after reporting profit for the latest quarter that blew past analysts' expectations. CEO Andy Jassy said growth for its booming cloud-computing business has reaccelerated back to a pace it hasn't seen since 2022. Because Amazon is so massive, worth roughly $2.4 trillion, its stock movements carry more weight on the S&P 500 than almost any other company's.

The U.S. stock market seems to be steadying on Friday, as banks recover some of their sharp losses from the day before. The S&P 500 slipped 0.2% in midday trading. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 23 points, or 0.1%, as of 11:30 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% lower. All three indexes drifted between gains and losses through the morning, but the moves weren't as jarring as the big hour-to-hour swings they had earlier in the week.

Facts are becoming less sacred by the day in Donald Trump's US, where many of his supporters now deny the very existence of truths. To them, inconvenient evidence is by definition bias. His followers and those who fear his fist are falling into line: media, universities and that infamous regiment of tech zillionaires who stood right behind him on inauguration day.

The purchase of U.S.-based Aligned Data Centers from Australian Macquarie Asset Management on Wednesday is the first deal for the AI Infrastructure Partnership formed last year which includes Abu Dhabi-based fund MGX and Elon Musk's startup xAI among its backers. "With this investment in Aligned Data Centers, we further our goal of delivering the infrastructure necessary to power the future of AI," said BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, who also serves as the chairman of the AI Infrastructure Partnership.

There is pressure, fair enough, but this is not about US companies, but about the misuse of market power, no matter where the headquarters are,

European laws have helped civilise the online landscape, but now we can only look on in envy at some new features launched by Apple that are not available to users here We said we wanted Big Tech to be regulated. But is it worth losing out on features and services? Maybe, maybe not. But there's now a gap opening between us and places like Britain and the US in mainstream services we can get from our tech because of new EU regulation.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Dana Schoolsky, a 24-year-old working in monetization strategy and operations at TikTok in New York City. It's been edited for length and clarity. When I worked in investment banking as an analyst, everything felt urgent, as if a fire alarm was going off at all times. I felt on edge even after leaving the office, never knowing when I might be called to action to do more work, which took a toll on me.