The European Union is considering a tax on the financing of telecommunications networks by GAFAM.
The tech giants are indeed, and by far, the platforms that consume the most internet data. They thus derive a disproportionate advantage from a network that they could well be led to subsidize on the territory of the European Union.
The GAFAM occupy half of the network
The European Union definitely wants to make life difficult for GAFAM. While the Digital Market Act has already partially entered into force on 1er last November, the European Commission is now considering a possible financial contribution from American tech giants to its internet networks. To do this, it will carry out a consultation with telecom specialists.
According to the major operators on the continent, Orange, Telecom Italia, Deutsche Telekom and Telefónica, the five groups cited in the acronym GAFAM (Google, Amazon, Facebook-Meta, Apple and Microsoft) as well as Netflix are by far the largest consumers of data on the Net. Together, they would account for more than half of the traffic. Something to reflect on the relevance of participation, in cold hard currency.
Net neutrality in question
In the questionnaire that will be submitted to operators, but also to major tech players, the European Commission will ask them for their opinion on a possible financial contribution for “ big traffic generators “. She also wants to know their opinion on the identity of the players who should be taxed and the potential impact of such a measure on innovation, the internet ecosystem and on consumers.
Unsurprisingly, Big Tech companies consider such a mechanism to be the equivalent of a traffic tax, in violation of the principle of net neutrality. The latter implies that all users can have access to Web infrastructures in the same way. This principle did not, however, prevent Industry Commissioner Thierry Breton from advocating for such a tax last September.
Source : Reuters
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